Sabrina’s Virtual Internship Experience

Sabrina recently completed her 2-months internship with us as a Digital Content Creator Intern at 1337 Ventures. In this article, she shares her virtual internship experience working remotely. 

Throughout the summer, I had the amazing opportunity to be an intern at 1337 Ventures as a Digital Content Creator within the marketing department.

I began my time at 1337 Ventures stumbling on my words in the first whole company meeting due to the sheer nervousness, as well as excitement, of starting my internship at a company that does so much for the Malaysian start-up community. However, my experience was not defined by this first hiccup I had, but the confidence and maturity I built over time with the work I was given and the people I was surrounded by.

The bulk of my work consisted of creating social media content and writing articles from how to create the perfect pitch deck, to comparing the benefits of raising funds through Venture Capital vs Equity Crowdfunding. This not only gave me the opportunity to research these foreign topics but to understand them to a level that enabled me to produce content regarding it. One of the things I will cherish the most throughout the experience was the responsibility I was given from day one, I would often forget that I was a mere ‘intern’ rather than an active member of the 1337 Ventures team. There was not only the expectation to produce work of high quality and professionalism but that the work I was doing mattered to the company.

In addition to the responsibility given through the work assigned, I was also provided with the opportunity to attend workshops from all angles, from marketing workshops which taught me how to strengthen online presence with Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) to Equity Crowdfunding and Pitch deck workshops. The plethora of workshops I attended gave me the opportunity to not only enrich knowledge specifically for my department but within the industry as a whole, which is far more than I had hoped for when I first applied to be an intern at 1337 Ventures.

During my time, I was under the guidance of Shannon Chow, the head of marketing at 1337 Ventures, who I can proudly say I will now look to as a ‘Shifu’ and lifelong mentor. She took me under her wing and was not afraid to give constructive criticism where it was needed (or k-drama recommendations in exchange for tips on how to raise her newly adopted cat). I am incredibly grateful to have had the opportunity to work within her department alongside Erin and Callista who made my Monday mornings far more bearable than I could’ve imagined. In addition to this, despite having never met anyone at 1337 Ventures in person, I was able to form close relationships with everyone in the company, including the CEO, Bikesh Lakhmichand, who would never fail to constantly check up on me.

Though the team is small, this doesn’t deter from the masses of work the 1337 Ventures team does, I am so grateful to have been able to witness the work they do across departments that cover all the realms of the startup world. As mentioned, though I began this experience with a debatably character making or character breaking experience, I left with both hard and soft skills that not only help me with the rest of my time at university and my future work endeavours, but as a teenager that will soon have to master adulthood.

If you are interested to join the 1337 Ventures team, visit our Careers page for more information about internships & full time jobs.