Drew Rosen interned with FC Tucson, gaining gameday operations experience on the Event Operations team.
How did you get your internship?
I got my internship by taking initiative and reaching out to FC Tucson by cold calling them on the phone. I spoke to two people on the phone, then I got set up with a Zoom call for an interview, which felt really smooth and easy. The overall search and interview process wasn't too bad, but I didn’t hear back about the interview until a week later, which was definitely the scariest part. After that one week, I received an email saying that I was offered a position for the summer and I was really excited. I love soccer and sports, so when I saw the offer email I was super excited to get started.
Why did you choose this internship?
I chose this internship because I want to work in the sports world and there is no better way to get started than by working for an organization like FC Tucson. I love learning how teams operate, and I have been playing sports my whole life so being a part of a team is something that I wanted for my internship experience. I am a diehard Celtics fan and Manchester United fan, and the sense of loyalty and camaraderie that I feel for the people and fans of those teams is something that I want to feel working in sports: being a part of a team and working together to achieve a goal. On the Event Operations team, it means working as a squad to make sure the gameday is run smoothly without any hiccups.
What kind of work did you do throughout your internship experience?
I did a lot of different work for gameday set up: helping out with ticket sales and scanning, running social media, helping out with halftime, and tearing down everything after the games. It was great to learn about how many pieces of the puzzle go into creating a smoothly run sporting event. Running the info tables and the VIP section has also helped me learn more about customer service. I had the opportunity to see the inner workings of how a professional team sets up a home game day. It was super cool and I learned so much.
What new knowledge and skills did you develop in this internship?
Some transferable skills I learned were tickets sales, event production, customer service, leadership, and social media. I learned that it is not easy to run a USL League Two soccer team and that it can be very stressful at times. I also learned a lot about customer service and how much organization is required to run such a large event with so many attendees. Overall, these transferrable skills have helped me learn so much about all the different roles and aspects of gamedays at FC Tucson. I really want to work in sports after college, so these are the exact types of skills and experience I need to gain to continue pursuing opportunities in sports in the future.
What has been the impact of your internship experience?
The impact of this internship experience has been in helping me develop transferable skills and expand my network with new friends and professionals in sports. It will be advantageous to have this experience on my resume and also have more professional references within the sports industry. Another impact of this internship is how much I learned about the role social media has in building a fan base for professional sports teams and how much thought goes into the frequency and timing of their posts.
How has your internship experience influenced your plans for your future?
This internship has confirmed that I want to continue pursuing work in sports. I am so passionate about it, and if I could have that level of passion about my job, that would be amazing. This opportunity really has been important to me because the sports industry is so broad with so many niche areas of work, I feel like I got my start in operations to have some sort of focus to build upon. I was worried it would take me longer to find out what area of the working world that I would want to be part of, but this internship has helped me lean towards continuing work in sports.