My fellow seniors and I waded into the real world this last week. As part of COOL Week, or Career Opportunities on Location, we got a taste of a future career path that interested us.

For my placement, since I’m majoring in Public Relations at Texas Tech University next fall, I went to the communications side of IBM.

This was not what I was expecting at all. I expressed my interest in political communications initially, so I was expecting Texas Senate, but I’m so glad I went to IBM instead. The very nice (and very busy) people at IBM taught me a lot about my future career and made some choices clear for me.

1. I belong in communications

All the activities I did during COOL week inspired me and challenged me. I realize now how much I genuinely enjoy talking to other people and crafting my message. It was great to constantly be engaged with other people.

2. I do not belong in every branch of communications

After talking to Ciri Haugh, who works in external relations, I realized that I definitely need to be in media relations. Her job was by far the most intriguing of all the jobs I sampled there. While there are many challenging and important jobs involving internal communications, I don’t think they are for me.

3. I should not work in technology

Communications is only as interesting as what you are communicating about. And while technology fascinates many people, it does not fascinate me. Also, it mostly goes over my head.  I could never do justice to the wok of IBM or any other tech companies.

While these may seem like minor discoveries, they aren’t. I could have spent thousands of dollars trying to figure out where in the communications bubble I belong, but because I did COOL week I have a pretty good idea.  I am so grateful to all the people who coordinated and participated in this opportunity. And to all the juniors, take advantage of it.