Since after my secondary school induction where I was asked to sing a hymn from my student assembly manual with my scary voice in front of the whole school, I have been scared and I swore to dodge any induction that comes my way. Genesys tech hub internship Induction 2019 was on the 20th and 21st of June, it was late this year compared to the other years due to some of the issues with the universities academic calendar and the Asuu strike action which took place late last year. For me, my congratulatory message came in a bit late, so I had little or no time to prepare for the induction day, how was I the one preparing for an induction? It didn’t even occur to me till now that I am writing this article.

I had to come in from Anambra state which is almost 2hours away from Enugu and my trip wasn’t a very nice one, I was driving the bus with my mind and the driver wasn’t responding to my mind speed rate. I actually got to holy ghost bus stop 50mins before my driver arrived physically and I couldn’t wait for him to park well, I jumped down and boarded a keke heading to waec bus stop.

Luckily for me, the bus was still there at 10 am against the 9 am takeoff, we took off on a journey I call the rough ride starting from the express to the gate of gulf city estate. We got to the entrance of the office building and I saw franky with his camera, I remembered how difficult it was for me to figure out a signature pose on my interview day, it wasn’t funny, yes ! it wasn’t.

We came and Nwangwu Ositadinma the learning and development coordinator came in to apologize for starting the program late this year, “we were actually meant to start in May but your lectures and your government decided to go on a strike” he said. Just after which, chigoziem who was in charge of the programs for the day came and we went on introducing ourselves, I was almost scared because you will have to say your name with an adjective and such an impromptu test wasn’t something I was ready for, but thank God for the fast internet I had to do a quick search for adjectives that go with the first letter of my name “P” scrolling through a long list I choose “PEACEFUL” it sounds more like what I needed at that point. After we introduced ourselves alongside mentioning the name of everybody that introduced his/herself before you accordingly, Mr. Ekene the head of innovation at Tenece was called for a brief introduction and welcome talk, he kept on saying after that he is old but my mind was saying the opposite. Osita gave us a talk on mastering, he actually played a Ted talk video in place of the sermon-like talk, the video was on mastering by sal khan, with the title “let’s teach for mastery not scoring”. After the video, he came back up and we discussed the points raised by the speaker, it made it more interesting and I avoided saying a single thing.

snapshot of the TED Talk you might want to listen.

We played a team game, we were shared in 4 teams of 5people each, and 2 boards were given to the team leaders, the board was to be given to two members of the team one should stand at the back and another in front, then a drawing is given to the person at the back and he is meant to draw what is on the board on the back of the person in front of him, then the person in front will draw at the back of the person in front of him and it keeps going, the person in front is meant to draw what he feels on his back on the second board. After that, the boards were collected and the lesson of the game was told. And it was that a story that is not from the origin must have lost some things and it is not real, so anytime we hear a story we should try to go to the origin. Interesting right?. Apart from the fact that they claimed my team did ojoro because we were the closest the getting the drawing.

chigoziem addressing the interns

Emma who was actually the last speaker for the day came on and he talked about learning2.0, he focused his talking more on the Nigerian educational system and how Genesys tech hub is trying to change the narrative. He told us stories of his personal experiences from his university, the way his lecturers taught him and how they were going about learning the wrong way. This was actually my favorite talk even though I can’t remember most of the things that he said. After his talk, we took our light refreshments and we went home. We actually dismissed around 2pm, it was a quick one.

On the 21st (day2) it was more of the culture of Genesys and introduction to the company’s core value which Osita said is what guides the people in the company. we were told how things worked and the do’s and don’ts of the company, he also introduced us to the curriculum and the team members who will be working with him to make the internship worth it. Susan from the people and culture department spoke to us on the things we are allowed to do and what we are not allowed to do, she told us she is the one that will deduct our salary when we default. Yes! You heard me right, Its a paid internship.she gave us a game which most people find weird, to me its just funny, she asked us to pick members of animals from a cup and we were placed in a team of same animals and we were asked to behave and make the noise of our chosen animal, fate left me with chicken and thank God for my personal experience with chicken, the only big deal for me was to avoid being the team lead. We did as she said, it was actually fun and at the same time weird. The teams were asked to write a poem, I still can’t believe I am part of the people that produced the worst poem I ever read in my life, it wasn’t that bad anyway, we signed our engagement letter which they were telling us to read as if we had an option? we went on a tour around the facility, we were shown our workspace, restroom, kitchen, etc. the bus was already available but some of the guys feels like playing game on their first day. Lol, we have PS4 console in office. You heard that right !.

fellow interns in the game room

I wouldn’t want to be trashed before I start work so I had to respect myself and head home. It was a welcoming and nice experience, at least I had a team to do the chicken thing with me, not like I was asked to sing alone in my secondary school induction, I still fear inductions but, Genesys induction is not the one anyone should fear.