Pathways at CRFU

Meet Meg Schmack, who began her CRFU life as an intern from Lincoln University studying Sport and Recreation Management, with a major in events management. Now, she’s running events like bringing the NPC game to the Rangiora Showgrounds

 How long have you been in your role at CRFU?

After my internship I was given the role of partnerships and engagement coordinator. This was a great role to start my career in and I was in that space for a year and a half. Recently, I was given the role of events executive, and I have now been doing that role for just over three months.

What support or mentorship did you receive during your transition from intern to a full-time position?

 When transferring from intern to full time I was given support from the whole partnerships and engagement team. They all knew that I was super excited to start and keen to learn everything I could about all of the different areas. In our team there is two areas, partnerships and engagement. In the coordinator role I was given a lot of opportunities when I first started to learn about both sides, helping our events executive at the time with her game days, as well as joining meetings with partners to get a good understanding of what the relationship management side of things involved.

What is your favourite part of your involvement with the CRFU?

The people are my favourite part of my job. The team I work with is so fun and easy to get along with, but also so hands on and ready to help whenever I need it. Everyone in the building gets along really well and work well as a team. I also love my new role as events executive as I get to see things play out that I put together, specifically the recent games at Rangiora, that was a big project for me this year and it was awesome to see it all come together. There is also so many other opportunities that come up through this job such as being able to help with teams like the Crusaders, the All Blacks, and the Black Ferns – such a good insight to how other teams run their games and so much learning available.

How has CRFU supported your development, and what resources or opportunities were most valuable to you?

 The organisation has helped me a lot with my career development, especially in my first role. Getting involved in all areas of our team was beneficial to me learning what I wanted to do with my career. Working with the partnerships team and learning about the relationship side of things was interesting. With my interest being events the events executive before me made sure to involve me in all of the processes that are done before events, so that I was able to learn more about them.

What advice would you give to others contemplating an internship with CRFU?

 I would say to definitely go for it. With Canterbury Rugby growing there is so many new opportunities coming up for people to take. If you do take on an internship at CRFU, I would recommend getting involved as much as you can. We are always looking for people to are eager to help, get involved and are happy to be there. If as an intern you make a good impression it is going to make a huge difference when applying for jobs either in CRFU or externally.