Now that the MTV Asia Awards are over, my stint as an MTV freelancer is over as well, so I headed back to the office to do my clearance and all that stuff. It was a very, very fun experience. Even though I left past 8:30pm almost everyday and with certain nights staying till past 11pm (record is 1am), it never really felt stressful or like work. It was like-minded individuals working towards something that needed to succeed.

In a lot of ways this reminds me of what Terence told me once while we were heading up the club together. He noticed I needed to work with people who knew what they were doing and knew their place in the scheme of things so that we could all work together without worrying about whether things will get done. And that was what life was for the last month: working with people who knew what needed to be done, and getting them done.

Enough serious talk, now for some pics!

The room we worked out of

Alcohol to help pass the days (and nights)

Cupcakes from Fara on her last week. They tasted friggin excellent!

Cheryl & I

Rachelyn and I

Darn I forgot to take pictures with the TAR team. But there will always be opportunities! All in all it was an excellent time and I’d head back there if they ever needed a new employee! *hint hint*

Last night in Genting for pre-work on the MTV Asia Awards ‘08 (until next Thursday) and it’s been back to back long days. Today is pretty cold and pretty foggy (pics tomorrow), but for tonight I wanted to just share with you my room in First World Hotel.

Nothing flashy, nothing extravagant. Just a bed, hot shower and a clean environment. I guess I’m a pretty easy traveler in the sense that’s all I really need. (Well, and internet access). Anything else is a plus.

When I come back next week, I should be at the Genting Hotel instead of this. I popped by today.. Bigger place so that might be nice! Update you guys next week!

I’ve been sitting on this post literally for months. I thought I had it planned out when I made the social media jump and the theme was “What do you learn from school?” to be focused on what they key takeaways from your education should be. But now that I’ve gone back to MTV Asia, I find myself in an extraordinarily special position in that the stuff I learned with my student club, SMU Broadcast & Entertainment, really mesh well with what I know about social media, as well as looking at operations from a business point of view that business school teaches you.

Of immediate importance at this job, I feel SMUBE trained me the most. Serving a year as the director of music programming and another year of bring the vice-president helped me to learn a lot about the music industry, which of course helps me understand more about what I’m doing now too. It was also quite satisfying when I met someone who used to work with Universal (the label), who remembers working with Campus Radio and remembers our PR director by name.

It also taught me to juggle 352398235 things at one time. For those who think SMU is tough, believe me, running a club and looking over personnel requirements, radio air time requirements, sponsorship requirements, managing tight deadlines, putting out fires and doing everything professionally is what’s truly tough. But looking back, it really helped train me too. Everyday I step into this office and literally think I’m just working in an extension of SMUBE. The difference is, of course, everyone knows what they’re doing and does it well.

I’m quite a firm believer that what you learn in school (in or outside the class) should follow your interests and for me it did (media and entertainment). And I’ve made an effort to make sure that my future internships and employment have been in sync as well. For me, that works very well. I always get asked why I’m in MTV (specifically in programming or talent artist relations) because I’m a business student, and I always answer that’s where my interest lies. Does it put me at a disadvantage to the true media students from other schools? Well, maybe. I definitely don’t have the technical knowledge that they have, but when it comes to managing work, people, the labels and understanding it from a business/media/entertainment point of view, that’s an edge I have over a pure technical view.

That’s been my story and I’m sure it’ll change. How about yours? Has university or school in general prepared you for work? Taught you the skills you need? Or have you had torrid times during attachments because you were just not adequately taught what you needed to know in school? Be heard!

Remember the “Welcome to Hell” message? I got in to the office on Monday to find it erased off the board but of course, the thing about working in a creative environment is that people need an outlet for their creativity. So today I came into the office to find this:

Of course she came in later and said “WHO WROTE THAT!” and looked at me accusingly. But it wasn’t me! I suspect ’tis the boss.

And I’m not hearing horror stories about someone who’s working with us who makes WK look tame. Please spare me drama up in Genting!

Oh ps: my dates for Genting are confirmed: 25th July till the 4th of August for a grand total of 11 days! I hope I survive the experience! Pardon me if I don’t blog actively during that time. But I’m going to try to take as many pics as I can and give you as exclusive a view of the “operations” without breaking any confidentiality agreements. Hope ya’ll will enjoy it!

On my third day in the office, I bought some donuts for everyone but amazingly, they weren’t finished in one day (could the MTV people have become more health conscious in a year?!)

So I decided to keep the rest in the fridge, when Rachel mentioned to me “Better label it, if not people will take. Especially the interns.”

So I thought to myself: “Hmm. If I put my name no one will know or care since I only just arrived……”

The solution?

WeiKeng is my colleague who apparently is scary to the interns. Needless to say, none of my donuts went missing. Next day she came to me and said “It’s people like you that give me a bad reputation!”

Obviously, WK is nowhere near as bad as people think and you wouldn’t die if you really ate her food. But it’s all good office humour! =)

Yesterday, after numerous conference calls and dragged out meetings our minds were kinda frizzled so I wrote this on our “board”, much to the amusement of my two colleagues in the “control room”.

Incidentally the skull isn’t drawn by me, but the “fire” is. Yes, I’m artistically challenged, I know.

And no, it’s not like hell at all. Just crazy chaotic energy that infuses everyone!

Just got back from my first day of work back at MTV. I started the day at 10am and ended at 8:45pm.

“What?” you say? “So late?” you ask?

The truth is I hardly even noticed that it was so late because

a) MTV is a truly comfortable place to be and hang out

b) I had so much work to do it didn’t occur to me to check the time.

I kinda miss having my table and having Ralph and Eve around, but working with the familiarity that is Chee Meng and Wei Keng and catching up with the interns kinda negates that feeling a little bit.

It’s almost hard to explain this stuff in words. A lot of it is overwhelming because I’m coming in smack in the middle of the prep, but the chaotic nature of the office is almost welcoming. I probably zapped more papers today than I did during my internship, but we all kinda know what has to be done.

If I went any further I’d probably start saying things like it’s the desire to put out a great show that has us working so hard or our passion for music or the love of the brand blahblah. Not that it’s not true, but it just sounds cheesy.

So here’s the takeaway: Work somewhere that makes you happy.

ps: The performers who will be at the MTV Asia Awards this year is still confidential, but trust me when I say, you probably won’t be disappointed! Stay tuned for more news

edit: One other thing that I really enjoy is that I’m given quite a lot more to do in terms of work and responsibilities. It’s liberating in the sense that they’re literally empowering me and saying “Go speak to the production manager of Band A and organise this”, and also very scary because I think the brand “MTV” carries with it a certain “legacy” and standard, and I’d hate to be the one that doesn’t live up to it. I really need to give credit to MTV for allowing the youth some leeway in the company.

Whether it’s what I’m doing now with liaising or previously where they entrusted me to literally be in charge of hours and hours of what is shown on the channel every day, it’s been great that they show lots of trust in the people they employ.