Hi Tiffany, Congratulations on winning March’s MVM! So how does it feel to win something that you created? Did you ever anticipate winning?
It feels awkward because people might think I rigged the system -laughs-. But I don't think that is the case for now because a lot of people voted for me and they gave good quality reasons as to why they think I should have won. I know a lot people who also deserve to win this month, but I don't know why my name is so popular. Pratima’s support was really surprising. I didn’t think she would support me so publically and on social media as well. I thought I would only get recognition cards in the Board Meetings so I was astonished and really happy to see that support within the club.
You have gotten a lot of recognition this month. It was a landslide victory if I've ever seen one. I know that Publications works mostly in the background, but what do you think most contributed to this victory?
I think what really contributed to getting that recognition was putting Publications out there. It couldn’t just be all about doing the Newsletter. I had to put more innovation and creativity into the work. I wanted to build a connection with the other committees. The blog was made to showcase the talents of WIB members and create common grounds between one another. The Marketing committee used to promote events, but now because of the blog, they can also focus on the internal affairs of WIB, and share our people’s contribution on social media as well.
When you first assumed the position of VP of Publications, what did you have in mind for the committee?
The main reason why I ran for Publications was because I like to write. I thought about running for Press Secretary, but at that time, the secretary resigned in the middle of the semester and there was no one to look to for guidance. For Publications, there was Kseniya, and she shared a lot of insight on what it meant to manage the Publications committee. I really wanted to learn the newsletter making process and was interested in figuring how Mailchimp (our newsletter platform) worked.
I also knew that I wanted to do the MVM system. At first I planned to have the the winners selected randomly instead of by votes. It was a really simple idea back then, but now that I have my Co-chair and committee behind me, it’s really went beyond what I had imagined.
Since I've had to pleasure of knowing you for many years, I wanted to ask you, if young Tiffany--perhaps 13 or 14 years old--could see you now, what do you think she would say?
She would be like, I admire you Tiffany! -laughs- because back then, I was a really quiet girl. I didn't think I would be interviewing people and leading a committee. I used to kind of shut off and push people away from me. Now that so many people recognize me for all the work that I do, I don't think that's something 13 year old Tiffany would have ever expected.
This is a question from someone who voted for you. “Why did you decide to create a blog for WIB and MVM?”
MVM was supposed to be an element I wanted to add on the newsletter to make it more appealing. It wasn't supposed to turn into a large system that included the collaboration with Marketing, Alumnae Relations, and Graphics committees. I guess at first it was just a way for me to win the VP Publications position when I was running. I saw the system on YouTube and I thought I could utilize it too. However, what I think really won me the position was my suggestion for the attendance log.
What is that for people who don't know?
In the past, the President used to send chain emails between all the VP’s and their committee members, asking them if they would be able to attend certain events. As you can imagine, it was an annoying way of taking attendance. I remember asking, “Why can’t you guys just make an excel sheet?” That really simplified the process and I got recognized for that at the beginning of the year as VP.
As for the blog, I didn’t really think about it until my Co-chair came along. She really wanted to do it so we thought about launching it during the 2015 Fall semester. The plan was to do event coverages and feature outstanding WIB members. However, not a lot of members liked the platform-- Tumblr--that we were going to do it on. It did not happen as people did not think it was a professional platform. Another thing was, we had busy schedules, and that hindered us from launching the blog. I sometimes wish we did launch it sooner rather than later because SYS was such a big event and I wanted people to read about it.
In the end, we ended up using WIX as our blog platform as it’s both professional and well-liked by people. Once we figured all of this out, we launched the blog at the beginning of the Spring semester.
How do you plan on using what you’ve learned as VP to your life after Baruch?
I assume my life after Baruch would be filled with accounting and that involves a lot of excel work. Luckily, I used excel a lot as VP. There's also leadership skills. I can run an entire committee pretty efficiently. At the start, I had some problems trying to maintain the relationship between the Research Assistants and Managing Editors in my committee. It’s something which I should have paid more attention to. But now that we have expanded the committee a little more, everyone has the same title and workload. I’ve encourage people to work more individually so that they can have their freedom to do what they want to do.
As VP, I’ve also learned how to work in a team as maintaining a relationship with the WIB board members is very important. An alumnae during the second alumnae event talked about how working in a team for WIB is similar to working in a team in an American corporate environment, and I completely agree with her.
How are you able to delegate tasks that was meant for 2 people to 6 people?
At first I was content with 2 people in Publications because all we had to do was maintain the membership database and send out the newsletter. However, Pratima announced that all committees need to be expanded and Publications was put on the spot to delegate tasks to 6 members. I started out with small tasks for my editors and research assistants. As I said before, the teamwork between editors and assistants did not work out so I made a change for the next semester where all committee members become managing editors. They will be responsible for event coverages, newsletter, and maintain membership database. I launched the blog and assigned editors to cover at least one event within two weeks which also fulfills the requirement of having one member per event. The answer would be to always push yourself and strive for self-improvement. I want to thank my whole committee, my co chair, Amy, my editors, Kari, Amberley, Jenn, and Divna. They honestly work so hard to make Publications great, it is a team effort and they are all March MVMs.