Wedding venue internship leads to employment opportunity
A GCU student has secured a graduate job after a successful internship at one of Scotland’s top wedding venues.
Amy McFarlane has combined the final year of her BA (Hons) International Tourism and Events Management degree at GCU with her role at Pollokshields Burgh Hall, which was recently revealed as Wedding Event Venue of the Year at the Scotland Prestige Awards 2023.
“The opportunity to apply for the internship actually came up through my lecturer Dr Nick Davies,” said Amy.
“I decided to apply and luckily got the role. I started working there at the beginning of June as an intern.
“The Pollokshields Burgh Hall was built in the 19th century and it’s an A Listed Building – it’s basically like a mini castle!
“The venue itself is used for things like weddings, engagement parties and birthday parties, but we also do community classes like pilates and Weight Watchers.”
Amy quickly had the chance to progress from her role as an intern after taking on a range of responsibilities within the team.
She said: “It’s a really small organisation and we’re basically a charity that’s run by a trust. I got taught how to take bookings for weddings and how to do viewings with visitors – it’s all about encouraging them to book with us. It was also really useful to get an insight into general administration and dealing with email requests.
“The General Manager was then looking for a new Operations Manager and ended up offering me the job. I was obviously delighted because I had only been there for a couple of months on the internship before getting that promotion.
“There’s definitely been points where I’ve been doubting myself but it’s all been so surreal, I couldn’t even properly work Microsoft Excel before starting here. I didn’t actually think I’d get a graduate job, never mind something like Operations Manager at a venue like this.”
Amy’s new role, which she’s been combining with her studies, has provided a range of new responsibilities and career opportunities.
“I now focus on coming up with things like marketing and social media campaigns. There’s a bit more involved in terms of having to deal with other business-related matters as well. The General Manager and I even do all the cleaning - so it’s basically a bit of everything.
“I really enjoy it because it’s very different to what I’ve done before – there’s a lot of learning and it keeps me busy. I didn’t see myself getting involved in weddings but my first one was amazing and it was such a happy day – I was even involved in helping fix the dress at one point!”
After success at the Prestige Awards in November, Amy is now expecting to get involved in more weddings in the near future.
“I certainly hope we’re going to be busy – winning the award definitely helps. It’s great personally for my CV and also my confidence, but I’m delighted we can also promote the fact we won Wedding Event Venue of the Year on our social media channels and website.
“We are in an excellent position and everything is well placed for the year ahead. We now want to push on and win more awards – I’m excited for what’s to come.”
Find out more about GCU’s BA (Hons) International Tourism and Events Management programme
By Ross Clark
Got an SHLS or GSBS story? Email me at Ross.Clark@gcu.ac.uk or message me on Twitter