Cooper Gervasoni

6.30 AM 

Every morning, I’m rudely woken up by my alarm and begin the struggle of getting out of bed. Eventually, I get up and begin getting ready which includes rushing to smash down two ham-cheese toasties before I have to leave.

7.00 AM 

I get in my car and begin the exhilarating commute to the office. This involves driving 5 minutes to the station, catching the 7.12 am train which arrives at Flinders Street station at 7.42 am, and then commencing my walk to work, in which I arrive at 7.55 am.

8.00 AM

My work begins! RACV and my team are pretty flexible on start times, so I start my days a bit earlier than most and get in at 8.00 am instead of 9.00 am.  I pick a desk and start by opening Outlook and Teams to see if there is any communication I missed after hours. I then have a look at my calendar and open tickets (tasks I have to complete), this helps me to jot down a quick list of priorities and questions in order to loosely map out the day ahead.

8.15 AM

I begin my first task for the day, an example of a task that I have been working on recently is an Adobe Analytics Dashboard which tracks and analyses certain marketing content sent out by RACV.

9.00 AM

Around this time is when I’ll have my weekly meeting with my manager, this is an informal meeting where we catch up on things and discuss work. This time is extremely beneficial as it gives me a chance to get out all the questions I have and get feedback on the work I’m doing. We talk through expectations in the coming week, and I always come out of these with a better understanding of how to successfully complete my work.

9.30 AM

My favourite part of the day! My whole team has made their way through the office doors which means it’s time for coffee, we have a brief discussion and decide on a new place to go get our fix. As we make our way to the unknown café, we all catch up on each other’s weekends and plans for the coming week. Yesterday’s choice was bulletproof coffee, which was coffee with butter in it… can’t say I recommend it.

10.00 AM

My team has a stand-up at 10.00 am, 3 days a week, a stand up is basically a meeting where everyone in the team discusses their progress with their assigned tasks in an attempt to meet deadlines for the current sprint (block of time that tasks are to be completed in). This is a great way to aid tasks that require collaboration because there is a holistic view of what everybody needs from everybody.

10.45 AM

After stand up I complete one of my daily tasks, the task is to monitor campaigns that we have sent out for the previous day. It involves me running a query in SQL to gather a count of sends on our campaigns. After this, I continue working on my tickets.

12.00 PM

It’s Lunchtime! The perfect time to relax, eat some food and chat with friends. Except for today I decided to go to the gym, as an RACV employee you get free access to the gym at Eagle House (the building next door). I smash out a 35-minute workout, quickly shower, and then spend the remaining 15 minutes searching for lunch which is usually a baguette (only $6.50!) from my favourite café, B3.

1.00 PM

Working hard! Pretty much for the rest of the day I am working on my tickets, which could include things like creating dashboards, gathering and analysing data in Excel, putting together presentations, etc.

3.00 PM

Now, this could be anytime, usually in the afternoon but it’s a pretty common occurrence as a grad to have a catch-up booked with someone. Whether that be with a member of your team to discuss a task you are collaborating on or a catch-up with your RACV buddy to check in and offer you advice on being a grad. Today my catch-up was with my mentor, as part of the Graduate Program at RACV they provide you with both a buddy (a member of last year’s graduate cohort) and a mentor (A well regarded RACV employee). This entailed getting to know each other, specifically our backstories and how we got to where we are now, which I found very insightful as it conveyed to me how he progressed in his job and in the business.

4.00 PM

At about 4.00 pm, I wrap up my workday and make my way over to the station to hopefully be home by 5.00 pm. This is perfect because it gives me time to still attend my out-of-work commitments, such as footy training. There’s also time to eat dinner, chill out and watch a couple of episodes of TV and get to bed by around 10.30 pm.

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