1. Find a real problem you are passionate about

First of all, you have to make sure to identify a problem that you yourself have and that you are passionate about solving. In my case, my work experiences in start-ups helped me recognize the importance of creativity in the future workplace. And also to rediscover my own creativity. Believing in my ideas empowered me tremendously and added a lot of joy to my life.

But when I re-entered university, I realized that most of my peers did not believe in their creativity. Just as I did before. That was the moment when I decided to change something. The idea of Creative Hub was born.

2. Build a killer team

“Diverse teams are simply smarter.”

This is the conclusion of an article published in the Harvard Business Review. And it was the guiding principle to choosing the founding members. However, when forming the team I was facing a major problem. I barely knew anything about all my peers, as it was my first week at a new university.

However, I also saw an opportunity in it. We could learn a lot about and from each other. When deciding who to take on the team, I trusted my gut feeling and paid attention to having a diverse mix of people. The perfect soil to grow great ideas, as another study shows. Everything that we achieved is due to our amazing team and I am grateful to have been able to work alongside all of them.

3. Establish meaningful connections with key decision makers

Now that we had an amazing team, we were ready to go. Well, not really. First, we had to learn that it’s essential to establish good human connections to the key decision makers in university and industry. In the beginning, it might seem to be too much talking and doing favors. But it greatly pays off in the long run.

Our good connections enabled us, for example, to co-organize an event with Alan Iny, Global Specialist for Creativity from BCG’s New York office. We understood that networking is “one of the most important requirements of new leadership roles.”

4. Build a track record

Being the new kids on the block is fun. You do not face many restrictions and you can do basically everything you feel is right. But it also means that no one knows what you are capable of. Thus, you need to prove your ideas and abilities. Our goal was to be taken seriously. So our focus was and remains on providing high-quality events and featuring high-profile speakers and companies.

From the above mentioned Alan Iny over the serial entrepreneur and Head of Future at the Municipality Cascais, Marco Espinheira, to Comon, the biggest private creative agency in Portugal, we managed to leverage our network to attract interesting speakers to our events and thereby deliver higher added value to the attending students.

5. Create a unique brand

We have a quite different approach to learning compared to common practices at universities. In order to highlight that, we needed to create a unique and authentic brand. And what’s the best way to do so? Engage the community!

Take our #creativators campaign as an example. We interviewed some of the students creating an impact at our school and shared their story along with a portrait on Facebook. Thereby, we not only reached thousands of students but also put people in the spotlight who personified the mindset we want to promote. The result? They felt proud of their achievements and shared the post with their friends. This way, our campaign became one of the most successful at our school in recent years.

Call to action

Getting recognition for your hard work is a great reward, but it is no substitute for the feeling of achievement when you realize that your work is impacting others around you in a positive way.

So, if you realize that you have a problem that others around you have too, do not wait for coincidences to happen. Take action yourself. One step at a time. Just like we did with our Creative Hub. Build a team, then a network, then a track record and then a brand. Looking backwards, you will be impressed by what you have accomplished.

Don’t wait, start creating today!

How to start a student club that impacts hundreds of students was originally published in Creative Hub on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

You are thinking about taking a gap year, but you’re not sure what you can actually take away from it? I have been there too and I can prove you that it is so worth it.

Saying that, I do not mean that I did everything perfectly. Most of these insights came after failing, after missing opportunities and after wasting my time following the wrong path. That is why I want to share them with you, so that you are able to do it better from the beginning.

During my gap year, I worked for very interesting companies: Project A Ventures, Homeday, Delivery Hero and BCG Digital Ventures. These are all great organizations, but it is not what I learned from them that made my gap year a huge success. And this is exactly what I want you to take away from this article: It is not going to be the companies that you work for, it is going to be the learnings on a much deeper level that will be so valuable for your professional and personal future.

So here is what you should really focus on during your gap year:

1. Create relationships

I think we all apply for internships because we believe that we are going to get something, that the people in this company are going to teach us some incredible hard skills. However, the reality is different. No one just gives you something, you have to be proactive and go get it. And the most valuable assets are not the hard skills, but the relationships you are going to create. As one of the most influential American entrepreneurs, Gary Vaynerchuck, puts it:

“Maximize networking. Shake hands, kiss babies. It’s the people that go work somewhere else, that are reminded by your tenacity and good-natureness and they are the ones that give you the opportunities.”

2. Discover yourself

Get out of your comfort zone and do things you would have never even thought about before. Take that job in Hong Kong, go bungee-jumping, speak to strangers on your way to work, present your ideas in front of your whole department, introduce yourself to the CEO and ask him to go for a coffee. Whatever it is that comes to your mind, try it! Challenging yourself every day is the fastest way to learn and grow.

Read inspiring books and take the time to reflect on yourself, your dreams and goals. Reading “The 7 Habits of highly effective people” and “The Subtle Art of not giving a Fuck” were two of the best decisions I took in my gap year. These books inspired me to ask myself big questions and made me reflect on who I am and where I want to develop in the future. This will add confidence and focus to your life.

3. Take decisions

This one is really crucial for your peace of mind throughout the gap year. Do not try to keep all options open for as long as possible. Decide on the internships you want to do, decide on the university you want to study at. Writing 40+ applications is going to stress you out and people reading them will realize the lack of focus that diminishes your chances of getting accepted. Thus, my advice is: Decide first.

4. Open your mind

“Minds are like parachutes; they only function when open.”

This quote of the Scottish businessman Thomas Dewar proved so right to me during my gap year. Be open-minded in every conversation you have. You can learn so much more from people from other cultures and especially other professions. Understanding the way engineers or designers approach problems can make you look at your own problems from different perspectives and that helps you to solve them in much more effective ways.

5. Have an impact

We as millennials have extraordinary qualities, we are genuinely aspiring to have a positive impact on the world. But we have a problem. We came to believe that we cannot have an impact in this early stage of our lives, that we cannot change the world. This, however, is not true. As Drew Dudley vividly explains in his TED Talk,

“There is no world, there is only 6 billion understandings of it. And if you only change one person’s understanding of it, you’ve changed the whole thing.”

Start by coming with a huge smile on your face to the office every day and spread a good atmosphere, integrate other interns who are new to the city, and discover more and more how powerful and able to create change you are.

Conclusion

You can use this year to learn so much more than just some skills related to a specific job. You can learn about yourself and connect with so many amazing people. This is a once-in-a-lifetime chance and it is all in your hands, you just have to go get it. So just follow these 5 simple tricks and you will make the best out of your gap year.

Call to Action

This is my first article published online and I am more than excited to get feedback from you. I am especially interested in hearing your thoughts on the topic and if you found other tricks to make the best out of your gap year or an internship.

If you enjoyed reading this article and it made you think about how to approach your gap year, please hit the Clap Button.