This summer has flown by! I can’t believe I am already writing an end of the summer blog post. Well, a lot has definitely happened during the course of the summer. I let you know about all the fun things I was doing around Chicago and all about Lollapalooza, but I haven’t told you much about my internship at all.
I have had a great work experience this summer at Abbott Laboratories and today is actually my last day. I will be heading back to Los Angeles on Saturday in order to help with new student events for incoming engineers and also I have to get back early in order to help out with rush for my fraternity. Rush is always a blast because it takes place the first week of school and each fraternity does a different set of activities during the week. I enjoy it because I get to participate in all the activities that the members rushing are participating in including a yacht cruise which is always my favorite part of the week.
However, I digress; this blog is about my time at Abbott. The rest of my internship has actually turned out to be so much more than I expected from the beginning. I got to act as a consultant for the Diagnostic Division and evaluate their current products while looking into solutions for their working environment. In the end I developed a solution that could save the company a significant amount of money annually with additional benefits in efficiency gains. I was in charge or putting together a presentation to demonstrate my solution to upper management and presented in on Wednesday. It went really well and I got a lot of positive feedback! After that we went out to dinner with the whole Tools Development and Workflow Automation Team to a place called Inovasi; it was an awesome dinner! In addition two of my co-workers bought me a tie and got me an awesome card for my last week which was so great.
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- Cassandra and I at Relay for Life with the Abbott Team
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- My work station for the summer
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- One of the lunches during Intern Week
Valuable Skills I Learned
- Taking care of lab maintenance on Abbott’s Blood Screening Devices
Specifically on Abbott’s Architect line of machines.
- Human Resources
We were in the process of hiring two new employees this summer so I got to sit in on their interviews, ask them questions, and conclude with management about final hiring decisions. Also I got to on-board one of the new employees into her new position and teach her the basics of what she needed to know for her job
- Case Competition
During Intern Week we were separated into case competition teams and we were charged with solving an economical problem for Abbott. Our team consisted of 10 people and myself and two others got to present our project in front of an Executive Board from Abbott.
- Technical Skills
I learned how to operate HP Quality Center, Microsoft Visio, Serena Business Manager, and IBM Rational DOORS.
I attended a training session with Cassandra about how to “lean” out processes and make them more efficient. We also learned DMAIC methodology and lean tools including: Value Stream Mapping, Poka-Yoke, Kaizens, and Key Performance Indicators.
Also my manager encouraged me to go an meet with other employees of Abbott in different divisions to see what I might want to do as a career. I was able to set up twelve informational interviews through the course of the internship and learned about everything from Technical Marketing to Patent Law.
- CEO of Abbott – Miles White – talking to all the interns during the Welcome Reception for Intern Week
- Attending a Cubs game in Box seats at Wrigley Field from one of the Vendors I was working with on my consulting project
- Going to Navy Pier to watch The Dark Night Rises with my co-workers
- Participating in my first Flash Mob during Abbott’s Relay for Life
- Meeting the Divisional Vice President of New Product Development
- Going to my first all you can eat Brazilian restaurant (seriously go to one of these place on an empty stomach, they don’t stop bringing the fresh carved meat to your table)
- The amount of networking I got to do
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- Wrigley Field for a Cubs Game
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- View of Downtown Chicago from the Navy Pier Ferris Wheel
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- Cassandra and I getting Lean Six Sigma certified
So now it is time to say bye for the summer. However, as much fun as I had this summer, I can’t wait to be back at USC. The weather, the people, the fun, even the classes, I am looking forward to all of it. Next semester I have a lot on my plate with a full course load including Molecular Biology, Linear Circuits, History of China, Statistical Methods for BME and the class I am looking forward to most, Technical Entrepreneurship. This class will be my first business class that I have petitioned to get elective credits for. I am doing this because I think I want to go into Biotech Consulting and I want to get a Biomedical Engineering degree with a bit of an emphasis in business. To do this I would like to take three business classes along with my regular biomedical engineering classes in the next two years. I can’t wait to take this first approved business class with my curriculum.
I’m looking forward to next semester so much and can’t wait to get back to Los Angeles! I’m really exited for the football games, new leadership positions I will be taking on, fraternity invites and exchanges, concerts, and of course having a yogurtland close to me once again!
Now Playing: Change of Seasons by Sweet Thing with Daylight by Matt & Kim on deck.
