Alumni Stories: Kim Mai – A dedicated companion

For those who are passionate and eager about working in Sales & Marketing, Import-Export but do not know where to start, Viet Trang Craft is undoubtedly an ideal and wonderful workplace for you guys. Not just an ordinary fibers homeware export company, here at Viet Trang we work with a belief in the motto: “Doing good while doing business”. This amazing feature is not only a huge inspiration to all the company employees, but also it helps to empower young interns from their very first steps into the real world, to do business with a nice sustainable purpose.  If you want to know how it’s like to be working at Viet Trang, let’s listen to what our alumni have to say about the Internship Program.

Kim Mai – A dedicated and passionate companion who is always full of surprises

Kim Mai spent 6 months of summer vacation to challenge herself as a Marketing Assistant Intern at Viet Trang Craft

One of the first impressions that people will see in Kim Mai is a dynamic, eager-to-learn intern, but no less a unique personality that is full of mystery. Her full name is Nguyen Thi Kim Mai and currently, Mai is an overseas student major in International Business with the focus on the Marketing field at Vaasa University of Apply Sciences (Finland). Last summer, Mai spent 6 months during her vacation to travel back to Vietnam and work as a Marketing Assistant at Viet Trang Craft. Despite her great interest in pursuing a professional Marketing career, she owns herself an exclusive (and pretty sweet) persona: a huge fan of BTS boyband, an animal lover and a minimalism promoter.

Although Mai is back in Finland, fortunately, we still keep in touch and have the chance to invite Kim Mai to do an Alumni Interview Session to re-evaluate Viet Trang Craft’s Internship Program. Let’s hear what she has to say about her working experiences as well as the valued lessons learned from our company.

1. Three words to describe your internship at Viet Trang Craft:

When asked about specific words to describe her summer internship here, Mai unhesitantly replied: ” I think my answer will be reassuring, exciting and most importantly: inspirational.

• Reassuring: having this internship experience has helped reassure me that I am definitely in the right major.
• Exciting: relating to some dull moments of me, every time I am faced new challenges and tasks, I am getting excited about what lies ahead for me and what I will learn.
• Inspirational: despite the fact that working for an SME as Viet Trang, the company is on a small scale with a less formal working environment, it was almost always a great ride to me. During my internship time, I always worked hard, learned a lot, and felt appreciated. For me, it was personally very rewarding.”

“Every time I am faced new challenges and tasks, I am getting excited about what lies ahead for me and what I will learn” – Mai shared

2. What have you learned during the internship at Viet Trang Craft?

As an overseas student, Mai surely had numerous opportunities in Finland, the EU, and many other countries. Ultimately, she chose Viet Trang Handicraft as her first destination. Talking about this decision, Mai said that she believed that every product has a story to tell – stories that will not only engage, inform, delight and impact the audience, but that will also deliver on measurable business goals. She wanted to be not just a marketer but rather than a story-teller who can inspire customers by the quality, ethical and other values contained within the product. Finally, she got to do these all with the tasks delivered related to Viet Trang’s product lines, business story and so on. With the multi-task work at Viet Trang, she hereby experienced personal development in the career path of her wish.

If asked about lessons learned during the internship, Mai eagerly shared: “I’m thankful for my internship in Viet Trang because it allowed me to grow, to experience the world and learn the traditional handicraft of Vietnam. Working now is more meaningful to me since the products are deemed to be special gifts made from Mother nature and skillful Vietnamese craftswomen. It’s opened many doors for me in my life, shaping my vision and I know this is only the beginning.”

3. Your most favorite memoir at Viet Trang Craft?

Working in Viet Trang for 6 months, Mai surely had numerous beautiful memories with all the people here. She recollected: “Maybe the moment I finished uploading all the assigned products on Alibaba platform accurately. That was the time I was in the company later than I had ever been. The feeling of this little accomplishment is somehow precious and lasting forever in my heart. It was my very project in Viet Trang – the Alibaba project which was needing more than 1 month to launch, as the company wants to expand the sale area in e-commerce platforms.”

Kim Mai and Viet Trang Craft Team in company trip at Ninh Binh and Phan Thiet

4. Your message to Viet Trang Craft’s new interns?

With such a confident and experienced intern as Mai, there is no doubt that she will gain more and more success in the near future. At the end of the Interview Session, she shared a highly inspirational note to all the new interns at Viet Trang: “You’ve worked hard to get this opportunity and you want to make sure you get the most out of it. I know that you are probably feeling at least some symptoms of nervousness and apprehension. Rest assured that your concerns are most likely nothing to worry about. Feel free to ask since Viet Trang’s working atmosphere is credibly dynamic and everyone is kind and willing to help you! Just be yourself and try a little harder every day. I hope that, if nothing else, you take away from this internship a possible lifelong interest in Vietnamese handicraft homeware products with a fully national pride within your heart. Good luck! ”

“I hope that, if nothing else, you take away from this internship a possible lifelong interest in Vietnamese handicraft homeware products with a fully national pride within your heart. Good luck!”

Although it was just a 6-month internship, Mai did impress all of us at Viet Trang Craft as a dynamic, positive, strong and independent girl. Despite the internship is over, we are still following Kim Mai on every step of her way. Dear Mai, we wish you the best of luck, health and success on your upcoming journey.