The Importance of Communication and Good Data: Final Reflections from My PWE at Summer Search
Written by Bam Purcell
Pictured: Bam’s manager and UNC MPA alumna, Alex Bartz ’16. Although their work was remote, they made the most of the UNC MPA community and met up in person at a local coffee shop!
As my Professional Work Experience (PWE) with Summer Search comes to a close, I’ve been thinking back on the two things I wrote about earlier this summer: the challenge of balancing local flexibility with national consistency and making sure every student’s voice counts through good survey data. Looking back on both, my PWE taught me valuable lessons about good data and communication and gave me insights about future career steps.
Before the internship, I didn’t fully anticipate how hard it is to lead an organization with regional sites that have different capacities, cultures, and needs, while still holding everyone to one shared mission. I knew in theory that this tension exists in any multi-site organization, but seeing it up close made the challenge more real. This tension highlighted the importance of good communication. For example, the monthly newsletter wasn’t just about sharing updates. It was about translating national priorities into something that felt relevant and clear to staff in different regions.
Summer Search also began integrating AI more deliberately into its workflows this year. Rolling out new technology across regions means making sure everyone understands the policies, expectations, and the “why” behind the change. This work of keeping people aligned, especially as new tools and processes emerge, is central to a smoothly functioning organization. I would love to continue building the skills to make this happen in my future roles.
In addition to communicating effectively, I came into the PWE curious about program evaluation. Helping monitor survey data this summer and seeing that data inform program design and strategy was gratifying. I discovered that I care about the intersection of data and communication. What draws me to this work is figuring out how to take what the data says and communicate it in a way that’s clear and useful to the people making decisions, whether that’s frontline staff, regional directors, or a national leadership team.
Looking forward, I plan to take Performance Management in the MPA program. I’m excited to learn how to design systems that track program outcomes and measure whether a program is meeting its goals. I also plan to take Data Visualization, so I can build on the evaluation skills I started developing this summer and get better at communicating outcomes in ways that are digestible to a wide range of stakeholders.
Beyond these two courses, I want to keep building toward a career where I help organizations stay aligned, making sure voices from the frontline all the way up to national leadership are heard and considered when decisions get made. This summer confirmed my interest in this work, and I’m grateful to Summer Search for trusting me with meaningful work this summer.
