Covid-19: IT 1.0 and IT 2.0

The Covid 19 hit us here around late February 2020. I was in my university when I heard that the first case of Covid-19 has been confirmed in my country- apparently, an Italian citizen tested positive for the virus in Lagos. Personally, I have been following the news and development of the virus right from when the first known infections from the virus were discovered in Wuhan, China. The university management immediately released a memo ordering the cease of all academic activities and eventually the closure of the university until further notice. I left the school to reside in my friend’s apartment for a couple of days before heading home.

I left a lot of unfinished projects and term papers in school with the hope that we’d be returning to school after a couple of weeks, but sadly that wasn’t as the case would be. A couple of days after the first case of the corona virus was confirmed, things became really bad as more and more cases were being reported. The government then imposed a lockdown so every hope of resuming school were crushed. I was supposed to commence my Internship May 2020 but one month lock down went to two, and finally the lockdown was partially lifted on the third month but school resumption was still until further notice. I decided to commence my internship program and not wait until school resumes hence the reason why I have internship 1.0 and internship 2.0

Internship 1.0 

I started an unofficial internship July 2020 at a construction firm headquartered in Ikoyi, and it was really great. I was assigned to a site at Keffi Street, off Awolowo road, in the Ikoyi area of Lagos upon my first day resumption. The project was a renovation work for a 4 storeyed building. When the managing director came that day, I was assigned to supervise some of the works ongoing there (Like really, My first day). At first I was surprised because I just resumed and knew nothing about the structure of their work there, but with time, I learnt that the Managing director was a very proactive person and likes people who approach responsibility proactively.

The managing director got to know that I can do quite a number of activities related to construction industry, apart from supervising construction works, I can also take onsite measurements, prepare bill of quantities, prepare program of works, prepare builders document, prepare project report timeline and update and so on. So he wanted to test my skills. I spent just 3 days at the site at Keffi before being called to another site at Banana Island, Ikoyi to take some measurements.

I spent most of my internship 1.0 here and was involved in quite a number of tasks and or activities. Generally, the Managing director was very impressed with my inputs in the company that he didn’t want me to leave when I wanted to. The truth is that I moved from being an IT student to being a site supervisor and the tasks were becoming too much as the project was a very big one. I eventually left the company but kept in touch with the Managing Director Company.

I prepare a couple of Bill of Quantities for the company while I was away and was very happy when the company got a big project form the Lagos state government with one of the bills I prepared. I also helped will a couple of other documents and summarily, I had a rewarding experience as I was able to learn quite a couple of things while I was with the company

The intensity of the corona virus was slowly reducing and by March 2021, my university resumed virtually and I had to focus back on school works. Yunno, picking up my term papers and projects where I left them. Exactly one year was wasted.

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Internship 2.0 

Upon completing my examinations, I commenced my official internship (with approval form the university management) with the same construction industry, and resumed at the site at Banana Island. My role in the company was a little bit more defined than the last time. i didn’t engage in full time site supervision but assumed more of a management role. I was assigned to negotiating contracts with vendors, valuation and variation of works for vendors, payment of vendors and procurement. A week after commencing my internship, the Managing Director travelled out of the country and I was pulled out from my primary site and then was asked to supervise all the ongoing projects in the company.

I had a driver assigned to me so sometimes, I visit four construction sites in a day to check the progress of work on these sites and then give report to the managing director. Sometimes, I also needed to go to the office in order to prepare project reports that will be sent to clients and sometimes other business partners. In a way, being on the road most time was actually fun, especially the dramas that do happen in Lagos traffic was trilling to watch.

I stopped resuming to site after I was involved in an accident on my way to site and had to stay at home for two months recuperating and healing. I am currently shuffling between Lagos and Ogun state as we have a project ongoing at Ogun state. I am going to complete my internship this month and resume my finals next month. 

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