SouhailAboulhoda, a third-year international student inHonoursScience and Business, shares his various co-op experiences and says that co-op has taught him to become more patient!
For his first co-op term,Souhailworked atin a Quality Assurance position. While working in the food industry,Souhailensured that all the foods coming out were safe, of high qualityand metboth the company’s and customers' standards.In order toaccomplish this, he supervised those who were preparing the food products, making sure that nothing was overlooked."When you work in the food industry, there is no room for error, because someone could get seriously sick,” says Souhail.
Fast forward toSouhail’ssecond co-op term, where he worked remotely as an Online Learning Assistant (OLA) for the University of ݮƵ. For this co-op, he worked closely with professors to successfully apply course content onLEARN. He helped prepare lesson materials, presentationsand lesson plans. To give a little more insight,Souhailworked alongside an ophthalmology professor,where he assisted with the course OPTOM 150.
Souhail’sthird and most recent co-op took place at. During his co-op here, he worked remotely from Dubai as an Operational Analyst. His role consisted of connecting clients to experts in foreignareas andcommunicating with various experts about the company’s business model, guidelines, and unique selling points."Oneof the cool things about working withLynkis that it's all about building connections, building relationships, talking to people, persuading people,” says Souhail.
Souhailhelped expandұDz to the Middle Eastern market. At the start of his co-op term, ұDz had no headquarters in the Middle East, and becauseSouhailwas already familiar with the market and the company was already interested, this was a great opportunity to introduce it to themandsuccessfully fulfill multiple client requests.
What was the biggest challenge while working atұDz?
“The hard part is that you have to fulfill client requests before your competitorsbecause Lynk’s competitors are GLG and some of the other big names around the market. What happens usually is that the client doesn’t just send it to one company, they send it to like five different companies at the same time. It’s usually a race of who can get an expert faster.”
How do you think working atұDz has helped you develop yourself?
“One of the things that I learned most, other than building connections, is actually being patient. Because once we are recruiting clients and experts, we have to talk to them on the phone a lot. You have to be patient with clients that think they are being scammed. Obviously, I am censoring a lot of the words that were said before, but it’s a lot of being patient, being professionaland staying calm."
What advice do you have for students going into co-op?
“My biggest advice to any co-op student coming in is todo the thing that you are afraid of doing. It may sound hypocriticalif you think about it first, but once you start doing it, then you start building that momentum and you don’t want to break it, you want to keep going. You can apply that, not just to applying to jobs or working, you can apply that to any aspect of life. If you’re too scared to go to the gym, just start. Just start for a day, two days, and once you start seeing progress you’re not going to want to stop.”
What's next for Souhail?
Souhailis currently on his 3B academic term and is actively applying to jobs onݮƵWorksand other external job boards for his final co-op term. He has also been making the most of his time on campus by attending soccerintramurals and getting more involved!