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While searching for a healthcare or hospital-based internship, I was introduced to Known Medicine through my school’s Career Services at the David Eccles School of Business, which I started at in Summer of 2019. While it was not my initial plan to intern at a biotechnology company centered around cancer and drug discovery, the topics seemed to be interesting and the people were welcoming and brilliant. Marketing enables me to creatively merge logic and understanding to guide decision-making. Subsequently, this year-long internship at Known Medicine gave me an opportunity to develop my interpersonal, organizational, and job-related skills.
When the team at Known Medicine offered me this internship opportunity, I was incredibly excited, but absolutely nervous. Not only was this my first full-time internship in Marketing, I would be working in biotechnology, which was a completely new area for me. I joined with a shallow understanding of the work being done at Known Medicine. However, throughout my internship, my colleagues have continued to teach me new concepts in biology, data science, and the structure and development of start-up companies. I was able to contribute to this team by providing my skills in industry research and competitive analysis, brand management, graphic design, and digital marketing.
During my time at Known Medicine, I collaborated with an external marketing firm, Minus Plus, and our company leadership on a few major marketing and brand development projects. In November of 2021, we began repositioning our brand for a release in early 2022. This project included a website relaunch, rebranding of marketing assets, and updates to our company-wide content. My primary role was organizing and updating our documents and content, including copy and graphics for the website and working with our contracted website developers to communicate our expectations. It was thrilling to learn many new skills in marketing project management and brand development. Now, you get to read this blog post on our incredible new site, filled with our beautiful branding and content that I am honored to have been a part of developing.
As an intern, I have been surrounded by incredibly talented and intelligent people. These individuals are dedicated problem-solvers. Time after time, I have been amazed by the knowledge and skills of my colleagues. With weekly company meetings, I have been able to better understand the work of each individual and how they are contributing to our mission of improving the lives of cancer patients. It is empowering to work at a company that is led by extraordinary women. As of 2019, just a little over a quarter of start-ups in the US have at least one female founder (Statista). Our co-founders, Andrea Mazzocchi and Katie-Rose Skelly, are pushing the social constructs that have defined the start-up and biotechnology industries for years. I am inspired by the work they have done in creating and leading an incredible company. As a young woman starting my career in business, I have been honored and empowered by the strong women I get to work with at Known Medicine.
My time at Known Medicine has offered me many moments of growth and development. I have learned how to develop and manage a brand while working with a number of different stakeholders. I have been challenged to push out new and exciting ideas surrounding our mission, platform and cancer care on social media platforms. It's been challenging to create content of topics in which I don’t have an extensive background, but it has taught me to collaborate with my colleagues to exchange ideas and knowledge. I am so grateful for Known Medicine’s connection with the University of Utah that introduced me to this internship opportunity and for their trust in me to take over the marketing challenges of a start-up company. I am excited to leverage the skills I have developed here at Known Medicine as I continue on in my education and career in marketing.
Melissa Orlandi is continuing her studies at the University of Utah and plans to graduate in May 2023 with her Bachelor’s degree in Marketing with Honors.
