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Natalie Babin

April 20, 2021

Project Narrative

KINS 4306
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My internship was at Oconee Valley Healthcare in Greensboro, Georgia. I completed my

internship alone with no other interns. I interned under Allison Hawk as the Marketing and

Outreach intern. I worked alongside the administration and healthcare team in providing

marketing and outreach to the community and company. Most of the community outreach

programs were either canceled or moved to virtual due to COVID-19. Therefore, I was unable to

execute those outreach activities that would have naturally taken place. Originally, I intended to

plan one of the community- outreach programs as my project, although COVID-19 made

narrowing down a project more difficult. The concept of the project was to do something for the

organization, so I decided to keep my project internal, and focus on the Oconee Valley

Healthcare staff. I spoke with my site supervisor on ideas that would be most beneficial to the

clinic.

After our conversation, I began to do some research on the previous March Madness

Healthy Living Competitions that took place the past two years. The purpose of the March

Madness Healthy Living Competition is to instill the health initiative of healthy habits among the

staff. The program encouraged total health and fitness as well as uniting the company by way of

a 4-week friendly competition. Before going forward with the competition, I made the decision

to send out an interest survey regarding the program. I decided to make some changes after

hearing feedback from the interest survey I sent out. Majority of the responses were positive,

although some employees made suggestions to make it seem more like March Madness. This is

when I decided to create teams instead of an individual competition, as well as adding bonus

points to make it more competitive. I then wrote up an invitation email and outline that explained

the competition and each week. Each week focused on a different health component. Week 1

was centered around exercise, as it is essential to healthy living. This could have been any form
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of exercise for example, running, walking, working out at the gym, Zumba, etc. Week 2 focused

on nutrition, as it is another necessity to an overall healthy lifestyle. The participants were

required to send in pictures of their food as it had to comply with MyPlate balanced meal of half

a plate of fruit/vegetables, quarter plate of grains, and quarter plate of protein. Week 3 was

positivity, encouraging the participants to have a positive mindset in the workplace by

performing random acts of kindness. The final week was tracking steps, as walking 10,000 steps

is the recommended daily step target for healthy adults. Health initiatives such as these are

incorporated in the community outreach and awareness that takes place, but it is just as important

to encourage the healthcare workers as well. I wanted to bring light to a healthy lifestyle in a way

that the employees would want to be involved in.

The overall project went well. My goals involved creating a competition for the

employees to participate in that promotes an overall better health and wellbeing in the workplace

and to reduce health problems within the clinic. My site supervisor and the chief clinical officer

responded well to the project. I believe I did an overall great job in creating and implementing

the program. Luckily, this program was able to happen in person and I was able to be in contact

with the participants in person and through email/phone. If I were to do it again, I would find

ways to keep the participation strong and advertise the competition more. There were multiple

employees who filled out the interest survey stating they would participate, but when it came

down to it not every person signed up. This is not to be said in a negative manner, as plenty of

employees still participated. The participation from all five teams started off immensely strong in

week 1. The level of participation remained steady until the final round. With that being said, I

am still proud of how the program turned out and appreciative of the employees who did
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participate. I believe the purpose of the program was to encourage healthy fitness and eating

habits and I think that was accomplished.

For my presentation, I will be creating a PowerPoint that highlights the weeks of March

Madness Healthy Living Competition and the breakdown of the focused components of health.