A second IBL placement (read this article for brief explanation), was provided to Nic by IBM, which was split into two distinct work placements:
- Commercial Sector — Client Program Office
- Public Sector — Medibank Private
The first department and experience were characterised by numerous spreadsheet and process-driven work. Database and report generation skills were key competencies. As recorded in the placement report, a database was designed to manage service requests for … Ansett! This was during the dying days of the airline whose death knell was sounded in September 2001.
The strongest memories of IBM came from the second department where Nic was transferred to after six weeks. It was a unique experience for him, being a mere student or “associate” at the time. The Medibank program office was outsourced to IBM, and effectively operated as bridge between both companies. Nic was inducted and trained by the team to be an asset manager, which he took on-board readily. The responsibilities and work opportunity in this role were well-defined and he took over from a full-time employee who later transitioned out of the team. Assuming a highly operational role where he more or less helped to represent the IBM brand to Medibank personnel, Nic performed IT asset auditing, order fulfilment of IT equipment for projects and asset disposal for end-of-lease equipment.
Nic adopted and benefited from the dual corporate cultures of Medibank the client, as well as IBM; indeed through IBM, he was fortunate to attend both the Australian Open tennis tournament as well as the Formula One Grand Prix that year. He had the responsibility of fulfilling duties for the then newly-appointed Medibank Managing Director in ensuring he had his printers delivered and set-up before the Easter long weekend.
Above all, Nic’s communication skills and focus on delivering a quality customer experience would summarise key development/learning that hetook away from his time with IBM.