Source: Freepik
Over the past few weeks, we’ve been providing you with information about the training program for management assistants in dialogue marketing. With this article, we have now reached the end of the blog series on the DiMa training program. We have presented the profession in the form of a profile, explained the application process, and one of our current trainees has described the training and the path to it from his perspective. In the previous article, you could read reports on the experiences of internal former trainees.
In order to provide you with the final exciting perspectives, Katharina and Nina will now report on their experiences. Both have successfully completed their training in contact centers and are now working at the IT center.
Practice and Theory
My name is Katharina, I am 27 years old, and I completed my training as a management assistant in dialogue marketing in 2020. I did my training at a contact center, where I was mainly responsible for providing telephone support to customers. During my training, I attended the vocational school in Lindenstraße in Cologne twice a week. There I learned a lot about project management, business and social issues as well as communication and had the opportunity to improve my business English.
New Experiences and Personal Mentoring
Since I didn’t really enjoy just doing telephone support, I started looking for new opportunities even before I finished my training. It was important to me that I not only do telephone support, but also work independently. Since one of my classmates was doing her training at the IT Center, I got curious and applied without further ado. And what can I say? It was 100 percent the right decision!
At the beginning, I was trained in the various services in a one-to-one mentoring by an experienced colleague. The intensive training gave me the chance to get to know all the services in detail. Since I hadn’t had too much to do with IT before, I really appreciated the fact that I was taken care of and everything was explained carefully. Almost all employees in our Service & Communications department provide first-level support. This means that we handle requests from users on site, by phone, via e-mail, and chat.
Operational and External Tasks
In addition to day-to-day support, all employees are assigned their own tasks. My ongoing tasks include organizing department meetings, maintaining our internal and external documentation, coordinating first-level support, supervising our print service and trainees. I am also a member of the IT Center’s party team. Here we organize parties and activities for employees together with other colleagues. The cordial interaction, the joint parties, the remote work option, and the many opportunities for further development have excited me from the very beginning. I enjoy the contact with the students and employees of RWTH Aachen University and I am happy to be part of this great team.
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Working in a Contact Center
My name is Nina Laakmann and I am 26 years old. I completed my training as a management assistant for dialogue marketing in a contact center in 2019. My activities there consisted of telephone and written contact with customers. I also looked after the social media channels and was responsible for coordinating call distribution and tasks at the ACD system (Automatic Call Distributor). In order to also learn the theoretical part of the training, I attended a vocational school twice a week. The vocational school for training in dialogue marketing is located in Cologne. There, knowledge was deepened in the subjects “Project Management”, “Business and Social Issues” and “Communication”.
Work Experience and New Challenges
After I had successfully completed my training, I wanted to gain professional experience and worked in the contact center for two more years. After the two years, I realized that I would like to take on more challenges. Through one of my best friends, I became aware of a position in the IT Center. As a result, I applied for this position and, fortunately, I was hired.
I’m responsible for first-level support, which means that the Service & Communications department, where I work, handles inquiries about our various services in person, via phone, e-mail, and chat. Of course, day-to-day life isn’t just about support. One of my permanent tasks is deployment planning. Here I plan the assignments of the employees in our department with regard to working hours and room occupation. Furthermore, I am responsible for organizing the departmental meetings and for coordinating first-level support.
Professional and Private Life
I am also a member of the IT Center’s party team, in which we organize joint festivities such as company trips. We are a great team, which is really important for a nice togetherness. In addition, the work-life balance is very good as we are offered the opportunity to work remotely.
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At this point, we would like to thank all readers of this blog series. We hope that the articles have sparked interest and answered questions. If you’d like to check out all the posts in this blog series, you’ll find them linked at the top of the first paragraph of this post.
Responsible for the content of this article are Jelena Ćulum, Nina Laakmann, and Katharina Röhrig.
