Entry Two- June 12, 2020
Week two has been extremely busy at Kikori, however I have come to realize it is an essential component of the company’s culture. My tasks have been heavily focused towards content creation, and thankfully I have been on the consumer side of social media content since the ripe age of twelve. Creating a marketing strategy for our Lifetime Membership Campaign has been a combination of becoming very well versed in Canva, building out a content calendar, and pursuing relationships with influencers within the educational space on social media (a group I never anticipated interacting with) has been met with large learning curves on my end.
My favorite part of everyday has been coming in to the office every morning and hearing about the new and exciting developments that were conceived the night before. Every single morning, Kendra tells me of a phone call, email exchange, or some sort of interaction she had the previous night which produced major and exciting news. I feel extremely fortunate to be working at all this summer - let alone having a really great job..
An aspect that I am working on bettering is my organizational skills. After a great brainstorm session or discussion with Kendra, I will feel extremely motivated and get right to work on the new idea or task. However, I neglect to write down details or the other small jobs I have been assigned. This is a unique part to the job that I have yet to encounter in my previous experience. In order to streamline this process and keep track of the multitude of small jobs Kendra and I create for myself throughout the day, I have found a new best friend - Trello. The checklist option in the board settings has proven to be an efficient method towards managing my tasks.
A large topic of our conversation has been centered around the current state of the country following the protests in response to George Floyd’s death. It is interesting to find myself behind the wall of a company making decisions about the stance we want to take and how we would like to demonstrate our beliefs. From a consumer standpoint, it seems very simple, however once you are inside, especially in a company like Kikori, who is focused on increasing Social Emotional Learning skills in students and providing teachers with the appropriate tools to do so, it becomes very clear that there are a lot of moving parts to the process of communication with consumers.
One of my favorite moments has been the ability to sit in on meetings with advisors of Kikori. A lot of very experienced individuals have chosen to align themselves with the start-up, and the opportunity to sit and listen to these professionals expertise in all aspects of business is not only informative, but extremely interesting as well. Learning more about the sales funnel, data usage, and the types of roles that will need to be filled due to scaling and growth of the company are all things I have had very limited exposure to.
My competitive drive loves the thought of Kikori expanding and creating major breakthroughs within the space and verticals it operates within. When I speak to Kendra about this she also loves the idea, because the expansion of Kikori obviously means the startup is successful and an intriguing aspect to business, but more so due to the fact that she can help students and teachers all over the world. As much as my mind is directed towards growth and expansion, Kendra always remains very grounded and dead set on helping others.
I don’t believe that many business moguls have held onto this genuine positivity and kindness as one of their guiding principles, but I’d like to imagine a world where they do.