After finishing her first year of business school, Denise Kootin-Sanwu (Fuqua, ‘21) took on a Sales Innovation Internship at LinkedIn, where she got the chance to flex both strategy and execution muscles on a CRM transformation project. During her experience, Denise got to experience the LinkedIn culture, build relationships with her peers, and gain exposure to working at a company on the edge of tech innovation. In this interview, Denise spoke about her summer internship on the Sales Innovation team, and what she learned throughout the experience.
MBASchooled: What did you do for your summer internship, and what attracted you to this opportunity?
I was a Sales Innovation MBA intern at LinkedIn. I wanted to work in the tech industry because I realized that tech is no longer the future, tech is now. I was also attracted to the impact that tech was making in shaping our everyday lives.
I was attracted to the Sales Innovation role because it is similar to an internal consulting role. It would allow me to both develop strategies and implement them. I wanted a position that would allow me to see my work through from start to finish.
MBASchooled: What project(s) did you work on during the summer, and what were the most important skills you used for them?
My project was to develop a scalable model to virtually support the global sales team during the transformation of its CRM processes. The most important skills I used were getting alignment from various stakeholders, balancing multiple priorities, and communicating my project’s strategy at a high level to multiple stakeholders, as well as managing the details of execution.
MBASchooled: What was it like to build relationships virtually? What helped?
Building relationships virtually is never easy, but LinkedIn’s strong culture helped. There’s a saying at LinkedIn that “relationships matter,” and it showed throughout my internship. People are generally willing to have a virtual coffee chat, especially with interns. I took advantage of this by connecting with people all over the firm, including Fuqua alumni, members of the Black Inclusion Group (BIG), and people in other lines of business that I wanted to learn more about.
My manager also helped me to build relationships by giving me a list of key stakeholders to begin meeting with and people who could help me learn more about the team. He also scheduled daily meetings with no agenda, just for the team to hang out. These meetings helped me get to know my team quickly. They provided an informal “water cooler” moment that we would use to chat casually.
Virtual happy hours, virtual game sessions, and leadership speaker events also helped me get to know members of my broader team, other MBA interns, and interns at large.
MBASchooled: What was an important lesson that you learned from your summer internship?
I learned that a strong, healthy culture can help a team weather a lot of storms. A lot happened during my internship this summer at LinkedIn. The company had to continue to manage the impact of COVID-19, there was a change in CEOs, there were tough conversations around racial injustice, and there were layoffs due to the economic downturn. None of these alone make for an easy work environment, but LinkedIn handled each head-on with transparency and compassion. My team was also a source of compassion, guidance, and support through it all. They were hard-working, resilient, and still managed to have a good time along the way.
MBASchooled: What was a challenge that you had to overcome or work through?
Like many people working virtually, I had to overcome the challenge of stepping away from my computer to take breaks for meals or walks during the day. I had the tendency to schedule back-to-back meetings and work through the day, without the regular breaks I would have if I were working in the office. I made progress by blocking off time in my calendar for lunch, breaks, and walks and communicating these breaks to my team.
MBASchooled: Knowing what you know now, what would you do to prepare in order to be even more successful in your internship?
I would have spent more time learning about best practices for remote work and how to hold myself accountable to those practices. Applying boundaries while working remotely, such as taking breaks, is crucial for one’s overall health and productivity at work.
MBASchooled: How is the experience in summer internship, and what you learned informing how you approach your second year of business school at Fuqua?
My summer at LinkedIn showed me that relationships truly matter, especially in tough times. It makes me want to prioritize investing in relationships with my classmates at Fuqua. I plan to build on the ones I have and make new ones before I graduate.