We were very proud of our COG, Melissa, when she announced in January that she had been through a very tough interview process but had been accepted on FIFA’s Protocol Team for 2 months for the Women’s World Cup games, in Rennes.

Well, the hard work has now come to an end and Melissa sent us this piece, with some photographs, of her time looking after many VIP guests, during June.

“FIFA Women’s World Cup France 2019™ VIP Protocol Programme.

2,500 applicants had to be appointed for the FIFA Women’s World Cup and 250 were to be posted at Le Stade Roazhon Park, Rennes en Bretagne as Rennes was one of the 9 host cities.

My experience at the 2012 Olympic VIP Team Protocol was truly amazing and I knew deep down, mixing my love for football and looking after VIP guests would be another great opportunity. The terrifying part for me, was having my interview in French back in 2018. I spent most of my rest days and lunch breaks on apps and listening to podcasts to brush up on my verbs & grammar.

So, when I received an email early in January this year saying I was successful, of course I was absolutely thrilled. However, there are a couple of people I’d like to thank, Evie Freeman, Daniel Myles and Gus Stewart for making it happen.

The VIP Protocol 2019 Women’s World Cup Team was to be a very small group of 10 candidates.

This department team played a preparatory and organisational role, and lent a hand with general activities designed to make sure that the VIPs attending the competition enjoyed the best possible experience.

This whole experience gave me a broader vision of the world and how you see people from different backgrounds as well as how you communicate with them. More importantly, having a good customer service perspective is so crucial in today’s world that we cannot ignore it, especially in business. It is inevitable to deal with people from diverse cultural backgrounds, so we must have the ability to cope with cultural diversity and language issues.

So, with roughly 269hrs of spoken French, it truly has been amazing. Merci FIFA.

@FIFAWWC
#DareToShine”

Well done, Mel!  You definitely “Dared to Shine”!