Association Logement France Japon

February 2012 - February 2013 / Paris, France

Student Accommodation & Insuarance & Internship Brokerage Service

SUMMARY The association is located in the center of Paris to offer housing/insuarance/internship brokerage services, mainly to the students of Association des Amitiés Asiatiques (A.A.A.), one of the biggest French language schools in Paris, but also to external students. Our main job was to manage more than 200 accommodations by establishing contractual agreements with residences, studios of SNCF, LaPoste, and individual proprietors to subcontract to international students.

OUTCOME Increased the revenues of the Korean cliental branch by 150% and appointed as a new MD.

MILESTONES

Project for South Korea Market Expansion

I started as an intern in February 2012, in charge of client reception and marketing. 2 months later, I initiated a project to develop the Korean cliental branch, which was the smallest at the moment. The project was a success raising the Korean branch to the largest segement.

After the project, I was offered a managing director’s position from the founder of the association who decided to retire from her position. I found the opportunity of managing over 200 accommodation units in Paris as well as supervising five multinational employees to be invaluable.

~~Asian Language Courses~~

Externally, I constantly sought diversification of the business as more and more residences were on renovation process. In May 2012, I launched Asian language courses, which I concluded to be appealing to the existing customer base, and this has led to successful horizontal diversification.

At that time, Korean wave was riding high even in Europe, notably thanks to Psy's Gangnam Style that made a big splash all over the world. As a result, it raised interest of Korean culture and language amongst Europeans so that our language course could attract many French students.

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Whilst running the association as a manging director, I have gained an in-depth understanding of different roles between managerial and non-managerial positions.

For instance, as a leader and liaison of the organisation, I was responsible for negotiating with managers at LaPoste and, SNCF; recruiting and training new hires; and staying in regular contact with wardens of every residence. As a subsequent consequence of successfully fulfilling this role, I was able to develop excellent interpersonal skills and a deeper appreciation for how crucial Human Resource Management (HRM) is to organisational success.

Furhermore, I took the position of decision maker at many critical points in the association’s history. Internally, I subdivided tasks by country in order to optimise operational efficiency and efficacy.

Annual Beajolais Nouveau Party and the Lessons...

In addition, organising a Beaujolais Nouveau music concert in an attempt to expand our customer base has strengthened my organisational skills.

I learned many different aspects required in business through first-hand, trial- and-error experience, from marketing to managing finances and above all, the importance of teamwork. Yet, the most unforgettable moment was when I had to lay off an intern I hired due to financial difficulty. Feeling tremendous guilt, I became more eager to hone my management skills with the desire to be a good ‘leader’ rather than a mere manager in the future.

Employee Performance Evaluation System

As a monitor and spokesman of the organisation, I took the initiative to design a database system based on employees’ past performance records as well as a bonus system in order to more easily account for individual employees’ productivity and to boost employee morale.

Employee performance evaluations and progressive discipline go hand in hand as tools supervisors and managers can successfully use to correct behavior, motivate employees, and set employee goals. My performance evaluation system was based on simple Excel spreadsheet but played a critical role to my HR management. And I decided to give a bonus to a worker that was given the “Employee of the Month” reward each month.

This experience had acquainted me intimately with the organisational structure and all of its minute components in addition to the importance of Customer Relationship Management (CRM).

Partnership

SNCF is France's national state-owned railway company and and manages the rail traffic in France and the Principality of Monaco. Parme, SNCF-affiliated organisation, was our largest accommodation supplier.

La Poste is a postal service company in France, operating in Metropolitan France as well as in the five French overseas departments. Ageloh, the La Poste-affiliated organisation, was our second largest contractor.

Le Cordon Bleu is the world's largest hospitality education institution, with over 50 schools on five continents serving 20,000 students annually. We formed a partnership through education programmes for Japanese students.

FranceStay is one of the largest homestay agencies in France, dealing with more than 500 host families. We could supply quality homestay services to students thanks to FranceStay.