Marketing and Sales in Europe : Reviews (Dublin)

My favorite part of this program was the learning environment of being faculty-led, opposed to classroom based. Specifically, students visited companies in both Ireland and London where we learned sales tactics, training programs, and opportunities for career development in the host countries markets. This was extremely beneficial as we learned first-hand how business, specifically marketing and sales, operates and how these practices differentiate from the United States. I feel more equipped to enter the workforce, categorized by globalization, post-graduation after this study abroad program!

I enjoyed learning about the history of business in England and Ireland as well as being able to do some sightseeing as well.

The element that I found most rewarding was experiencing a completely new environment and learning how to navigate and succeed. For example, public transportation is the preferred mode of transportation in Europe, which differs from most states in the US. This experience challenged my problem-solving, attention to detail, and preparation skills as the group and I navigated travel during the program. Additionally, I deepened my team work ability through interacting with both the students in the program and locals. Most of us had never met one another before traveling, and we all had very different personalities. Through this trip, I learned how to respond to different personalities and productively communicate to reach a common goal (whether the goal was to decide where to travel on our day off, or what train route to take to arrive at our company visits on time).

Being able to meaningfully engage and interact with the culture of the various places we visited was what I found to be most rewarding, as the places we stayed allowed us to experience each of our locations up close.

I learned that one can learn more about the world around them and experience vast personal growth through sparking a conversation with a stranger. When the group had to use public transportation, 9 times out of 10 we would leave the train station with a new friend simply from extending a compliment to another passenger or asking them a question. In Ireland, many of the locals would start a conversation with the study abroad group as it was obvious we were foreign. Through these conversations, we learned the true colors of the political, economical, and environmental factors currently taking place in Ireland from a perspective that we would never hear in a classroom. Through these conversations, I found myself reflecting on my own day-to-day life in the states and the experience helped me become more self-aware of the life I live.

The most important thing I learned on this program was the various insights into business through a lens of culture, which provided an interesting look into how things function here in the US.