Sawadee from Thailand!

On this day exactly 6 months ago, me and my colleagues from ProTeam 31 embarked on our exciting and fascinating journey to the world of aviation. Time really is flying! I vividly remember the first time sitting in a conference room with my new colleagues like it was yesterday.

A lot has happened in these past 6 months. We worked a lot, traveled a lot, met a lot of new, interesting people, made a lot of valuable experiences –  and learned a lot.

My ProTeam journey led me to the department for digital innovation, where I had the amazing opportunity to work on the FlyingLab, a new concept that serves as an innovation platform on regular flights. This novel and unique format offers the possibility to the passengers to use the idle time on their flights productively by for example attending an in-flight conference on board. So far, 7 FlyingLabs with different topics and different characteristic set-ups have taken place – from said conferences over wearable testing flights to fashion shows in the aisles of an aircraft.

I was mainly involved in organizing the FlyingLab from New York to Frankfurt in the frame of the largest trade fair for digital marketing in Europe – the DMEXCO – which was our business partner in this case. Five top-class speakers held presentations with topics like social media or virtual reality – which were simultaneously recorded by camera and broadcasted to the private devices of every single passenger. A live conference above the clouds – that is something only Lufthansa has. And since everything that happens in an airplane is subject of a large variety of regulations, the organization of such an event is no trivial task at all: it involves thorough planning, coordination with airport authorities, the transportation security administration of the USA and countless other entities.

But this was not the only task during my time there: To further develop the FlyingLab concept, I was invited to participate in the Innovation Accelerator by my department, where we designed various possible modifications for future events like these. The outcome of our time there is a business model that will be presented in the Innovation Fund Board in the next weeks.

In mid-september all ProTeam trainees then visited the Singularity University in the Bay Area between San Francisco and San José. The program there was specifically designed to train us and our tandem partners – every ProTeam member got a management level tandem partner for this purpose – in the frame of topics like artificial intelligence, data science and other technological advancements that will have an impact on us in the future. The workshops at SU were combined with company visits, where every tandem was able to explore the landscape of aspiring start-ups according to their interests. A lot of input, many mind-blowing novelties, game changing innovations – this was the place to be!

So now – after our first ProTeam project – our journey continues. We had some time to relax in the past few days and right now, generation 31 is sitting in a white Isuzu van that will bring us from Bangkok to Pattaya, where we will work on our social impact project in the child protection and development center (CPDC) of the human help network. The atmosphere in the van is jocular and easygoing, we are very much looking forward to spend the upcoming four weeks helping the kids in need. Still, everyone can feel the thoughtfulness of every single ProTeamer in the air. What is the situation in Pattaya? Will I be shocked by the environment these kids have to grow up in? Will it get to us?

Tune in in a month’s time from now. Until then:

Laa Koon!