MY BIGGEST CHALLENGE AT TNT PROGRAM

In the second week of the TNT program, we learned React and Typescript. Although the engineering work still requires some time to comprehend, my biggest challenge with the internship will be the Program Management curriculum. 

The Project Management Curriculum is a 3-week course explaining the roles of project managers and the phases of design thinking. It comprises of individual and Team assignments ranging from developing a problem statement to identifying a viable solution. Our daily PM sessions include an hour of individual study of the curriculum, followed by an hour of discussion with our PM coaches about these aspects.

However, the PM curriculum is still a challenge because the concepts are utterly new to me.

 The only previous experiences that I closely relate to the PM curriculum are the individual and team project planning sessions we have during CSC courses at Berea. I am applying the communication skills from these experiences to the PM curriculum.

As we dive deeper into the program, I appreciate how vital it is to understand the product lifecycle. As a Computer Science student, it is easy to rush to the prototyping and testing phases of design thinking and neglect other crucial phases of product development like empathizing, generating, and ideating.

My strategy to overcome the curriculum's alienness is to utilize the team sessions with our PM coaches to understand the different aspects of the curriculum that I do not understand when I read alone. Additionally, I will seek clarity from my teammates about aspects of the team PM assignments that I do not understand.