Three Insights Gained as an Intern at DSS Asia 2022

Hey Everybody! It’s Lakshmi, reporting again from the APJ team!

I recently received valuable first-hand experience helping to run one of the team’s flagship events: the second annual Distributed SQL Summit (DSS) Asia!

This event brought together developers, architects, and business leaders from all over Asia and beyond. Vish Phaneendra’s roundup post provides a great recap. It was exciting to reach close to 1,000 unique attendees and watch 20+ different talks from thought leaders, customers, and partners. Now that the event is over, I decided to share a few insights gained from my first big assignment.

1. Innovate

One thing I learnt from helping out with DSS Asia is that sometimes, it is good to push beyond what we think is possible. Perceived limitations simply mean it is time to get our creative juices flowing and consider new ideas. One notable idea came up when the team was discussing prizes for our DSS Asia lucky draw. We wanted gifts of sufficient quality that a winner would find useful, while minimizing any additional logistics required (with attendees in multiple time zones and locations). A quick brainstorming session led to the purchase of Amazon gift cards that could be delivered in a click. (Psst… Want to check out the lucky winners of our draw? Sign up for our monthly SELECT Newsletter!)

2. Adapt

As an intern, I am grateful for the opportunity to have personally worked with our renowned speakers directly. Growth is not always linear and it took a bit of time and consideration to learn how to handle unique cultural nuances and time zone differences, including some errors along the way. I learnt how to take my mistakes less personally, accept the lessons they taught me, and use this experience for future  improvement. Zulaila Mohd, my supervisor for this project, was inspirational as she worked seamlessly with our speakers. Bronwyn Campbell, head of events and campaigns, also took time to mentor me on how to work through each aspect of the event. Here’s to learning how to make the best use of each medium depending on the purpose!

3. Communicate

As we all know, teamwork makes the dream work!

Multiple people worked together all over the world to make DSS Asia 2022 a success. We learnt to combine our strengths and resources to pull the event together more efficiently. I would personally like to thank the entire team for providing me with the opportunity to work with them closely. This meant I got to see how marketing, operations, and strategy came together from the pre-event stages all the way to the after action reviews. For instance, I gained insight from Suda Srinivasan while working on event topics, and help from Michael Haag for finishing up the topic synopses. I appreciated the diverse knowledge and experience of our team and what we could accomplish together.

Overall, the experience has been enriching and I hope to be around for DSS Asia 2023. Till then, I will be finishing up the final leg of school and completing some of my other projects.

See you on the next blog post!

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