LifestyleDMC

Placement organization

Name of organization: Lifestyle DMC
Town/city: Barcelona
Country: Spanje
Website: https://www.lifestyledmc.com/

Student

Name of student: Davide Salvatori
Specialist area: Tourism Management (EN)
Placement period: 2021-2022

Information about placement organization

Type of organization: Corporate Events Company
Organization’s activities: Lifestyle has 4 different branches:
– Event Services (organizing events such as Conferences, Incentives, Meetings)
– Virtual Events (the same as mentioned above but online)
– Leadership & Training (leadership courses on various topics such as company culture, communication skills, effective habits, etc. mainly targeted at improving soft skills of a team)
– DMC (In the past they only had this part, which is where they organize trips of all types for companies)
Target group of the organization: small to large firms in any business sector
Company culture: The company culture is quite a clan culture. You will feel part of a family where everyone’s voice is heard. You are expected to come up with your own ideas and they will be taken into consideration. It is hard to understand the level of every person at first as it is a flat hierarchy, so there is no clear difference between who is at a higher level than another person.
Number of employees: 5
Dress code: casual
Did the organization meet the agreements you made beforehand? Yes

Information about your placement

In which department(s) are you working?

Marketing, mainly focusing on all Digital Marketing

Brief description of your daily activities: – Creating and scheduling posts for the company’s social media pages (Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn)
– Creating newsletters to be sent out to past clients and prospects
– Updating database with new possible clients when needed
– Checking Google Analytics and Social Media insights to understand the current situation
– Creating and implementing marketing strategies

Some more tasks might be assigned once in a while that differ from the daily ones, but these are generally what you will be working on.
Brief description of your company assignment: Creating a brand new Marketing Plan stating all the operations which need to be carried out also in the future regarding all the aspects of digital marketing. This includes the company’s goals, how to achieve them, and what sources and platforms to use to do it. This way even after I leave the company will have a clear vision on what to do in the future to keep things consistent.
Comment briefly on your supervision by the organization: Raquel has been my supervisor during the placement period and Anna has been my mentor. Raquel is very enthusiastic and positive and she will welcome new ideas. She expects you to be as independent as possible and to be confident in what you are doing. Both will not give you much overall feedback on how you are doing, but you should ask for it.

Requirements for students on placement

What kind of personal skills are required for this placement? independent, team player, sociable, flexible, creative, organized
Additional company requirements for this placement? Writing skills, Canva, MS Office, Google (sheets, doc, drive)
English: Advanced
Spanish: Basic
French:
German:
Italian:
Other languages:

The trip

Mode of transport to reach your destination: Airplane

Accommodation

How did you arrange your accommodation? myself on an app called Badi, which is very useful. There are also Facebook groups which can help but are less safe. Most rooms do not come with a contract so do not expect to sign a contract as it is not common, but you can create your own contract for the room and ask the owner to sign it in order to be safer.
How did you go to work every day? Public transport. I used the metro to go to work and it took me about 15 minutes as I lived quite close to the office.

Visa / work permit / vaccinations

Do you need a visa? No
Do you need a work permit? No
How did you arrange the necessary documents:
How much time did it take to arrange the necessary documents?
Did you need certain vaccinations? No
How long in advance?

Language course

Did you take a language course before you started your placement? No
Would you recommend to have a language course prior to this placement? It is not needed. But be aware that many times they will speak in Spanish between each other for convenience

The costs in euros

Travelling expenses (e.g. return ticket): € 300 euros (return ticket bought separately 1 week before)
Accommodation (monthly): € 440 euros
Local transport (monthly): € 40 euros (you can get the TJove if you are younger than 25yo and you get 3 months for 80 euros)
General costs of living (monthly): € 400 euros (groceries + going out with friends etc.)
Costs of visa: €
Costs of work permit: €
What did the company pay for/to you? Transport

Culture

How did you prepare for the country’s culture?
It has been quite easy for me to adapt to the country’s culture since I am Italian, and both Spanish and Italian cultures are very similar in many ways. It is important to mention however that Catalan culture might be slightly different from the Spanish one. People tend to be a bit colder and sometimes they might speak Catalan to you at first. As I spoke Spanish quite fluently even before starting, I didn’t have any language barriers luckily and I am not really aware of the English level of Spanish people since I never spoke English to them. However, they are well known for not being able to speak it so well, therefore having Spanish friends might be hard. Overall, however, I had a great experience with the culture as it felt like being back home.
Did the culture of the country influence your performance during the placement in any way? In Spanish culture, just like in my culture, people might not be aware of boundaries when it comes to a working place. This means that you might receive messages and emails even after the working schedule, asking you to do something. Besides, if you are used to something like a German organization, be aware of the fact that everything might seem quite messy and unorganized at first but it is also a common cultural trait.

Future students on placement

Future students are free to contact me for further information: Yes
My e-mail address: davidesalv96@gmail.com

Other information

Recommendations on what to do and what not to do: – Be proactive and always propose new ideas.
– Be creative with everything you do.
– Be organized with the emails as sometimes you might have a few you will need to answer to.
– Do not interrupt regularly, try to figure things out on your own. You are expected to be quite independent.
Leisure possibilities in the city/surroundings of where the placement took place: There are so many things to do In Barcelona and I never ran out of cool places where to hang out with friends. If you live close to the placement company, be aware of the fact that you might be a bit far from the center, it will take you 30 minutes with public transport to reach it. Most young people and Erasmus students, in general, live in the center (avoid el Raval or Barrio Gotico as these are the least safe places in Barcelona).

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