Final Placement Report: Internship at The Next Web
Leonardo Garcia
s2841983
MA: International Political Economy
Coordinator: C.A.M. Wagstaff
MA IRIO Placement
July 2020
Table of Contents
Introduction………..2
Prior to the Placement………..3
During the Placement………...5
Introduction
My name is Leo, and I am enrolled in the Master’s degree program of International Political Economy at the University of Groningen for the academic year of 2019-2020. I am extremely grateful that I pursued this particular Master’s degree because it is an issue area that I enjoy studying and learning more about. Furthermore, I am also grateful for the opportunity of doing an internship during the Master’s degree, which is something that not all Master’s degrees include in their curriculum. One thing I realized when searching for work options, and also speaking to peers in other degree programs, is that being enrolled in a university makes job searching easier, especially for internships. The reason for this is because most internships in the Netherlands require you to be enrolled in a university in order to apply. Most degree programs do not include a placement in the curriculum, so many young individuals have little to no previous internship or work experience as they graduate university. This of course makes searching for full-time employment more difficult, and since they are not enrolled in an academic institution anymore, they cannot apply for internships in the Netherlands. This is why I am grateful that the International Relations Master’s degree at RUG includes a placement, because I was able to do an internship before I graduated from university. As a result, I imagine this will facilitate my search for full-time work opportunities in the near future.
From February 2020 to July 2020, I was a government program intern at a Dutch company named The Next Web (TNW). TNW is a relatively young company which was founded in Amsterdam in 2006 as a technology media company. Today TNW has rapidly grown into a multimillion euro company of over 200 employees, and was acquired by the London-based Financial Times in 2019. The company is involved in many activities in the European technology sector. Some of these activities include journalism on technology, consultancy, large-scale technology events organization, consulting technology startups on how to grow, and providing matchmaking services between governments, large multinational companies, and startups. Furthermore, TNW organizes one of the largest technology events in the world which takes place annually in Amsterdam and attracts over 30,000 guests and speakers. Today, Amsterdam is a large technology hub in Europe and the world with a myriad of important local
and foreign tech companies. However, this was not always the case. TNW prides itself on building the previously underappreciated Amsterdam technological sector by connecting actors, providing accurate information, stimulating growth, and consulting governments and companies on how to grow. Nowadays, after the success it had in Amsterdam, governments from all over the world who wish to develop their technology sector contact TNW for their insights and networks. The position that I held at TNW was in the government program of the company, which consults governments on how to improve their technological sector. Every government has an agency or ministry that deals with boosting technology in their territories. TNW works with all layers of government, from city, regional, national, and even supranational (i.e EU). These governments are mostly from Europe, but there are government clients in other continents as well.
Prior to the placement
I knew I needed to find an internship to begin in the second semester (February-July) of my degree, therefore I began searching for internships in early November. I was interested in staying in the Netherlands but I was also keeping my options open and searching for work opportunities in different countries. There are a few reasons why I wanted to stay in the Netherlands. As a non-EU citizen, my Dutch student visa allowed me to do an internship in the Netherlands, but for other European countries I would need to apply for other visas which takes more time and money. Another reason is that after living and studying in the Netherlands for over four years, I thought a work experience in the country would be valuable for myself and my CV. Another reason I was searching in the Netherlands, particularly in Amsterdam, is because the city is wonderful and the move from Groningen would not be difficult at all. I applied to around 20 organizations, most of them in the Netherlands but a few in other countries. Of those 20 applications, I landed a phone/skype interview with three of them. Of those three, two offered me an internship position, but one of them was an unpaid internship in Washington D.C which is a very expensive city to live in. The application procedure for TNW was very straightforward. I followed the link on the Linkedin job announcement, and completed the application by
answering many questions, sending my CV, and writing a motivation letter. Around one week later, TNW contacted me to arrange a Skype interview. A few days after the Skype interview I was offered the position and happily accepted it. This was already in mid-January and the internship would start in February, so there was time pressure to arrange everything with the university, find someone to temporarily stay in my Groningen room, and find a place to live in Amsterdam. Luckily, my placement coordinator at the University of Groningen was always available and always offered me support when I needed it. Due to the housing market in Groningen, it took me less than two days to find someone who would rent my room while I was doing the internship in Amsterdam. With all this considered, the most difficult part was finding a room in Amsterdam whose housing market might be perhaps worse than in Groningen. I immediately scoured facebook pages and contacted many people unsuccessfully until I was eventually able to find a room to stay in during my internship. Before moving to Amsterdam, I was aware that the costs of living were higher than in Groningen. The most significant difference in costs were rental prices in Amsterdam compared to Groningen. In Amsterdam, food and other expenses for a student are not much different, but rental prices are typically double what one would pay in Groningen. However, with the salary I would receive I was able to cover the differences in costs of living.
I had never heard of TNW when I found the job vacancy on Linkedin, but it interested me from the beginning. As an IRIO student in the IPE Master’s degree program, I have always enjoyed learning about ways in which the public sphere and private sphere interact. The company and specifically my position in the government program was very much revolved around this interaction between the public and private sphere. After my contract was signed by all necessary parties, TNW sent me reading materials to have a better understanding of what the company does and what my position entailed. Despite my position in the government program and its proximity to what I have been studying for the last few years, the technology sector was an area that I had little previous knowledge in. Especially considering that technological skills are far from being my strong suit, which is why I decided to pursue an academic career in social sciences in the first place. While studying the reading materials, I gained a deeper understanding but also realized that I had a lot to learn. By reading the materials I also noticed that my
responsibilities did not require much background knowledge in technology, since they were more business oriented. Prior to the placement I was expecting to help my supervisor find new government clients through personal and digital outreach, assist in the organization of TNW’s annual technology event, and represent the company in networking events. Despite being my first work experience in my study area, I had a good idea that client outreach and networking was something I would enjoy. Therefore, this job description excited me from the beginning and I was very much looking forward to improving my networking skills. On the other hand, I had never given much thought to event organization in a professional setting. To be honest, helping organize an event of over 30,000 people was a bit intimidating when I thought of it. However, I was thrilled to have the opportunity to assist in the organization of such a large and well known event in the world of technology. Furthermore, another factor worth noting is that my internship contract with TNW was for five months. The IRIO Master’s placement is typically around two to three months, which gives the student more time to work solely on the Master’s thesis. I knew that I would have to write my Master’s thesis while working a full-time job, so I was already expecting to work long hours in the second semester. However, this did not bother me too much because I also recognized that a five month placement would give me more time to learn about the company and the area it operates in compared to a two month internship. Of course, no one at the time imagined that the world would take a drastic turn over the next few months.
During the placement
The first few days of the internship was characterized by a bombardment of information. All the new employees were given an onboarding week where we set up at least a dozen online accounts for different platforms. From communicative tools like Slack, access to different databases for market research, lunch accounts, company laptop, office key cards, confidentiality agreements, work expenses, to name a few. This bombardment of information and accounts intimidated not only me but also the rest of the new employees. It was reassuring to know that I was not the only one who was worried about remembering everything they had shown us. With time, the new employees and I grew accustomed to the information that was provided in the
beginning. Over the next month and a half, I was introduced to numerous concepts of business development and given projects to coordinate. The main project I was responsible for was what TNW calls landscapes. These landscapes are a visual representation of a city’s tech ecosystem which includes fastest growing startups, top investors and venture capital companies, best trade schools, best business development projects etc. These landscapes are eventually sold to companies and governments or posted in company social media. It was a relatively new project that TNW was working on so I was not given many instructions, instead I was given the liberty to figure out the best way to reach the final product. This is not to say that my supervisor or other colleagues did not help when I requested assistance, but in general I had a great deal of autonomy in the project. Landscapes require extensive market research mostly using company databases, and then a designer to design the final visual. I am capable of conducting research, but I am not at all familiar with graphic design so I needed to find someone who was. The company designers already had large amounts of work they needed to do, so I could not ask for their assistance. In the end the solution my colleague and I came up with was to outsource the design work. I asked my supervisors for a small budget per landscape in order to outsource the design elsewhere. After their approval, I registered on an outsourcing website and hired freelancers from all over the world to design the final landscapes. Landscapes were not the only projects I was involved in but they lasted all throughout my internship. By the end, I conducted market research on over 40 cities, and outsourced the design to produce over 30 landscapes that were either sold or posted online. In my opinion, I would not have been given so much liberty in my internship if I were in a larger organization. TNW is not small, but it is not a traditional multinational corporation characterized by strict hierarchies. I believe a benefit of working in a younger company with a more horizontal structure allows interns to have more liberties and responsibilities. The landscapes project was a source of pride for me at work, because they were my responsibility. When I was given the project with relatively few instructions, I was initially nervous because I had no idea what a landscape was, how to conduct the research, or how to outsource the design. There were times when coworkers gave me negative feedback for slightly incomplete research or incorrect design but I always did my best to incorporate their feedback as much as possible. After completing a few of them through trial and error, I understood what
needed to be done and in the end my coworkers were pleased with the final products. Prior to the internship, I did not expect to spend so much of my time on spreadsheets conducting market research. Initially, it was not my supervisor’s intention to put me on the landscapes project for so long, but over time the landscapes became more important for the company and someone needed to do it. In all honesty, there were moments when I was somewhat tired of spending so much time on spreadsheets, but there were exceptional circumstances beyond anyone’s control that will be explained in more detail below.
While the landscapes took up a large portion of my working hours, I was involved in other activities when colleagues needed assistance. My favorite parts of the job were the networking events that I attended with my supervisor and later by myself. In the first month of my internship, my supervisor invited me to two networking events. The first networking event was organized by the Catalonian government, who is a client of TNW. I went with my supervisor and was told to speak to as many people as I could simply to demonstrate that TNW was present and to invite relevant professionals to TNW’s annual event. On another occasion, a colleague and I went to Den Haag to represent TNW at a conference organized by the U.K Trade and Investment agency. By the end of the conference, I had spoken to countless professionals, attended extremely interesting seminars, and was even able to convince two British diplomats to participate in our annual conference. Throughout my studies, I had always analyzed the works of diplomats and government officials, and these networking events were the first time in my life I had personally met these professionals. As a young intern, still enrolled in university, speaking to career diplomats from different countries was intimidating at first. However, I always thought to myself that in the end they are just normal people and I have never had too much difficulty interacting with new people.
Another significant project I was involved in was the organization of TNW’s annual technology conference that would originally take place in June 2020 in the last days of my internship. The event gathers hundreds of speakers, thousands of attendees, hundreds of employees, food and beverage catering services, sound systems, stage production, networking events, TV production, to name a few. I assisted my supervisor in inviting government officials to participate in networking events that would take place during the conference. My supervisor
already had the contact information of the government officials we wanted to invite, so I was in charge of contacting them, usually through email or video calls. I created an email draft and sent out over one thousand emails with invitations and information on the event. During the organization of the event, I also attended numerous meetings with officials from the City of Amsterdam to discuss logistics and potential partnerships. As a recently arrived intern, I was always the quietest one in the room because I did not have the knowledge to contribute as much as others could. However, I am very grateful that my supervisor always invited me to these meetings, even if it was just to listen. After a couple of meetings and more knowledge on the subject, I gained a bit more confidence and was able to contribute more. The annual TNW conference is a moment of great significance for the company, not only because it is exciting but also because it is a large source of revenue. I was also very excited to organize the conference and eventually participate in it too, but unfortunately exceptional circumstances changed the world and my internship entirely.
I started the internship in the beginning of February. On March 15th, we were told by the company to work from home for at least the next two weeks due to Covid-19 concerns. As we know now, the work-from-home order lasted much longer than the anticipated two weeks. After realizing that this situation would not end anytime soon, the company had to cancel the annual conference, which meant I no longer helped organize it. Networking events, which was the area I enjoyed the most ended entirely. This all meant that the landscape project was the only one on my virtual table for the next few weeks. I stayed in Amsterdam for a couple of weeks while working from home, but for family health concerns, bureaucratic visa issues, and uncertainty about the dangers of the pandemic, I left Amsterdam to return to my family. My supervisor had already made it perfectly clear that we could return home anytime we wanted and simply work from there, so at the time that was the best course of action for me. Unfortunately, this situation ended my favorite parts of the job. The networking events, the fantastic (and free) company lunch, the annual conference, seeing my colleagues every day, the Friday company drinks, and enjoying the city of Amsterdam, all came to an abrupt end. Not to mention the personal difficulties of suddenly leaving the country I had been living in for the last four years and not being able to say goodbye to close friends I had made throughout my studies. Obviously, I was
well aware that this situation was beyond anyone’s control and that the best thing was to accept it and move forward. All things considered, I was fortunate and grateful to work for a company that allowed me to move to a different country and continue my employment. I was also in a different time zone, which the company did not have a problem with. Occasionally, I had to work long nights when my presence was absolutely necessary, but in general I worked normal hours except in a different time zone. For the next few months, I focused mainly on the landscapes project, which became more important than ever for the company since many other company activities were put on hold due to Covid. As previously mentioned, spending hours everyday on the same spreadsheet was tiring at times. I never complained because I knew these were exceptional circumstances, and my supervisor was also well aware that the work I was doing became tedious after such a long time of repetitive work. My supervisor was always giving me new and different tasks in order to break the monotony of my work, but the bulk of my time after Covid was spent on spreadsheets. I imagine it was difficult for my supervisor to give me new tasks because the company in general was working at a slower pace due to the economic problems caused by the pandemic. Eventually, the company adapted to the circumstances and began focusing on organizing online events. With this, my supervisor was also able to give me new tasks which included inviting relevant professionals to the event, promoting the event on social media, and helping during the actual event. The event took place in June, and considering that it was online, it was extremely interesting and well organized. During the event, I spoke to many government officials and explained to them how everything would work, and how if any technical problems arose during the conference they could contact me. In the end, there were no technical issues and everything ran smoothly.
Reflections after the placement and conclusion
It goes without saying, that due to circumstances beyond anyone’s control, my job changed drastically from previous expectations. Before the pandemic, my day-to-day was similar to what I had expected before starting the internship. My learning curve at TNW pre-Covid was very steep. I was learning a lot, not only about the world of technology and startups but also soft
skills that one learns by being at the office everyday and attending physical meetings. I continued learning throughout my internship even after Covid but unfortunately it was hampered by the fact that I was far away, purely online, and in a different time zone. Other skills that I learned throughout my placement include certain computer programs that I had never used, I improved on spreadsheets, and I learned how to navigate certain online databases for research. As previously mentioned, technology has never been my strong suit, but after this placement I became more confident using computer tools and online resources. Despite gaining more knowledge and experience in computer tools, my placement was always interrelated to my studies. As a student of International Political Economy, in general we study how governments influence the market, and how the market influences governments. Since TNW is a middleperson between public and private entities, I was able to learn from both sides of the coin. On one hand, I learned how governments can influence their technology sector using business development programs, incentives, investments, trade deals, government contracts, and information. On the other hand, I learned about the impact of the technological sector and small business development on society. To bring a government client, you need to convince them of the benefits of developing small businesses and technology companies. These benefits include higher employment, higher tax revenues, more foreign investment, more global visibility, to name a few. With this placement, I was also able to have a better understanding of how these relationships work in practice. In my opinion, when strictly studying these relationships, it is easier to see the broader picture, but more difficult to see the practicalities of such activities. On the contrary, when I was involved in these activities in practice, it becomes more difficult to see the bigger picture because you are more concerned with the practicalities of such policies.
Despite the pandemic and all its consequences, I had an amazing time working for TNW. The company culture is very flexible and they really care about their employees. There were numerous perks in the job such as lunch, snacks, drinks, team outings, team building activities, flexible working hours, and a friendly atmosphere. It is a company with a very international workforce, and I never felt left out in any way despite not knowing the Dutch language. I had great relationships with my colleagues and my supervisor throughout my whole placement. Of course, there are slight disagreements from time to time on how to approach certain projects, but
that is normal in any type of human relationship. My supervisor always offered support when I needed it, never micromanaged me, and always treated me with respect. Clearly there was a hierarchy between my supervisor and I, but she always treated me as an equal and invited me to networking events and important meetings. A benefit of working in a smaller company is that as an intern you are given more responsibilities compared to a large company. I cannot say for certain, but I believe that if I had done a placement in a large multinational corporation I would not have been granted so much freedom, trust, and responsibility.
With all this being said, with regards to my future employment ideas, I gained more insight on my strengths and weaknesses. I always had the idea that my true strength is in external relations, and this placement reinforced that belief. In my opinion, I was able to conduct desk research accurately and at a sufficient level, but as an employee I would be better utilized in building personal relationships with others. This includes activities that require substantial human interaction such as networking events, client relationships, political relationships, and negotiations. My supervisor also agrees with me, and it is unfortunate that the pandemic prevented me from practicing my strengths. However, perhaps it is beneficial that I was forced to work on my weaknesses to help me realize what I really enjoy doing. As previously stated, I highly enjoyed my time working for TNW and learning more about technology sectors and startup ecosystems. Not only did I gain knowledge, but I also established connections with people in the field that can be useful for future opportunities. However, I do not believe I will pursue a career in the field of technology and startups. Perhaps one day as a casual investor, but not as a full-time employee in the field. I am not opposed to working in a private and profit-seeking organization, but for a long time now I aspire to work one day in a governmental position. During my placement at TNW, I worked with and talked to many government officials in different roles and countries, and realized that I wanted to be in their position. Perhaps if I reach that objective I will feel differently, but I learned something personally valuable during my time in a profit-seeking organization. I realized that the moments that made me the most content were not when we signed a lucrative financial deal, but when I understood the societal implications of what the company was doing. Especially in the startup world, where individuals put everything they have into their company, it was always pleasing to receive emails from
happy small business owners that benefited from our services. At TNW, as a student of political science I enjoyed thinking more about the societal implications of our services such as employment and broad economic development than private company gains. This is not to say I disagree with profit-seeking in a private company, far from it. However, as an employee, I would like to one day have a governmental position where I think more about broad implications rather than private gains. In conclusion, I am grateful for the opportunity that my university and TNW provided me. This placement not only provided me with knowledge in the field I worked in, but also valuable personal insights about myself, my interests, my strengths, and my weaknesses.
