My name is Harmke Lüken and I am a recent graduate from the International Business School at the Hanze UAS in Groningen. During my last year at Hanze I applied for the International Business Talent program, the program aims for international students that want to leave an impact in the region around Groningen with their graduation project. I applied and got accepted. 

The Company that was assigned to me was WPT – Waste Paper Trade in Winschoten. My projects topic lies in the area of Marketing. More specifically in the field market positioning and how WPT as a company can position itself in its international environment. During my graduation period I was mostly present in the office and did my research: primary as well as desk research, at WPT. However, I spent a decent amount of time in the library as well to write my thesis… 

After my graduation I started a four month traineeship here at WPT in the field of marketing whereas my main tasks are market research and all things that come to mind when you think about marketing. I especially like that WPT is a company with local roots but still has an very international team as we are doing business in a lot of countries. I am developing continuously here at WPT not only language wise (I’m working on my Dutch) but also through new challenging task. During my market research I learned a lot about how recycling in Europe works and it gave me a better understanding how we should act more sustainable towards the environment.