This summer I served as the lead underwriting intern for a company called GBU Financial Life in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. From day to day, I delegated daily tasks and schedules of all other interns to maintain efficiency. I also maintained contact between all registered insurance agents and third party companies to verify statuses of transfers of funds. Additionally, I was responsible for filtering through and entering all new business in LifePro each day, including applications and policy delivery notes daily

Throughout my time as an intern, I got a clearer idea of how I see myself as a leader and where I see myself in the business world. I am a leadership studies minor and a Mount Leadership society scholar here at Ohio State, so discovering my personal style of leadership is something extremely important to me.

I interned for this company over winter break, and so when I returned as an intern this summer, I was promoted to lead intern which resulted in a lot of extra responsibility in the company. I oversaw the other interns and gained extremely valuable people management skills. I learned a bit more about my personal style of leadership- I tend to be a more coaching and affiliative leader rather than a commanding or pacesetting one. The six styles of leadership were something I have covered in two of my minor classes, so it was extremely valuable to see that come to life in my internship experience.

I also learned a lot from my supervisor and gained a valuable mentor. She has always worked in the information technology department, but recently moved to oversee and supervise the underwriting, customer service, and information technology departments and has a lot of good ideas in terms of how the company should run and what direction she sees it headed in. We had lunch together a few times and we discussed where she sees me in my future endeavors. She explained that she sees me in a role that works closely with people as she said I have good people management and communication skills.

My project focused on gaining experience in the nonprofit sector of business. I had always had an interest in nonprofit because I enjoy service and wanted to use my business acumen to help others. However, a lot of my conversations with my supervisor and interactions with the interns I was supervising led me to realize that people management and one-on-one interactions with people is what is important to me to be able to help others. I am studying finance and am a peer financial coach for Scarlet and Gray Financial, and some of the feedback my supervisor gave me was that she can really see me in financial planning or a role involving people management.

I think this change and transformation was especially significant for my professional development. It can be somewhat overwhelming sometimes to decide and plan what career path I intend to follow in the future, but this was a significant step in helping me see where I best fit in the business world. This helped give me a clearer sense of what I want to do and how I can best use my personal skills and strengths.