By Katia Ratkovich November 15, 2023
In this next installment of our "Meet the Splunktern" series, we're featuring Sophie Chu, a Product Manager Intern in Santana Row. Sophie is a fifth year student at the University of Waterloo majoring in Economics. Read on to learn more about Sophie's journey at Splunk!
Hi! I’m Sophie Chu, a Product Manager Co-op in the Enterprise Dashboards team for summer 2023. Although no day is the same, here is what a day in my internship looks like.
Morning
It is nice to greet the office staff every morning and then head directly to the kitchen for breakfast! I usually grab a bowl of cereal, a banana, and make myself an Emergen-C drink to get some vitamins for the day. My desk is next to other interns, and between us there is a round table where we gather around every morning to chat and eat.
Afterwards, I open up Slack, open Google Calendar, review my to-do list, and plan what I will be working on for the day. My primary responsibility this summer was to drive and oversee the implementation of two workflows, so I usually spent some time catching up with them and preparing for the meetings I would lead throughout the day.
Our daily stand-ups are a great way to connect with our remote team. We have a question of the day that everyone has to answer when they give their update, and one time I learned that everyone wanted to learn Spanish so I ended up hosting weekly SPAN 101 sessions with my team! Workwise, this short meeting allows us to peek into what everyone is working on and get any help if needed. As a Product Manager, I make sure the engineers and designers working on the epics I am overseeing have everything they need and review if they have enough capacity to work on their tickets for the sprint. Our sprints last for two weeks. Ahead of these, I have led backlog grooming sessions, prioritized the epics to work on, and run sprint planning with our team.
Noon
I love lunchtime because I get to connect with different people! Some members of my extended team come once a week to the office, and it is great to have casual conversations and learn more about their lives. Sometimes we inevitably end up talking about work, and it ends up being very insightful as we get to brainstorm ideas together.
We get a free meal once a week at the office. For the other days, I try meal prepping… If you want to save money but don’t feel like meal prepping, there are many options around the office like Ike’s Sandwiches and Chipotle. If you do not want to spend money at all, there is a #freefoodsr channel where you can claim meals if you’re fast enough!. If you do want to treat yourself and go somewhere yummy, I definitely recommend trying out authentic restaurants in Cupertino, such as for Chinese, Korean, and Mexican food!
Afternoon
I truly appreciate how helpful and welcoming my team is. I have been very lucky to have Lizzy Li as my manager. Since day one she showed me how much she cared about my development and ensured I had all the opportunities (and feedback) to grow! I was also paired up with Eason Gao — a previous intern, Waterloo grad, awesome mentor, and friend. They are both loved Product Managers by our team and great role models to look up to.
Other projects I have been working on simultaneously are (1) extracting product adoption and engagement insights by identifying patterns in telemetry data using Splunk, (2) conducting user testing and analyzing Google Analytics metrics to update the beginners tutorial of our product, and (3) creating a social impact dashboard with other interns. This internship has truly helped me develop core Product Management skills such as product intuition, critical thinking, collaboration, and leadership. :)
Evening
Santana Row has been a lovely place to be in. I usually head to a hot (104°F) yoga class after work to be active and relax — fun fact, I convinced more than ten interns to try it out too! There is usually live music and a farmer’s market once a week, so simply walking around the area is very enjoyable. As I mentioned before, the food around here is delicious! Some intern friends and I love trying out new restaurants around, so we grab dinner and also end up getting dessert! I 100% recommend the D4 from Hui Lau Shan (a creamy coconut mango sago drink).
It has been fun exploring the Bay Area and road-tripping during the weekends! My favorite destination this summer has been Lake Tahoe. It has beautiful mountains with snow that you can see while kayaking or swimming on a hot day.
Want to learn more about the Splunk Internship Program? Visit our LinkedIn, or check out open Splunktern opportunities.