Digital Systems & Operations Intern

ABOUT ALU

ALU provides higher education for a higher purpose. Our students declare missions, not majors.They develop the real-world skills to take on the world’s most pressing challenges. And they take ownership of their learning from day one through our peer and student-led approach – because ALU believes in the power and agency of young people to start shaping the future right now. Together with a world-class faculty and staff, our students are igniting a ripple of positive impact across Africa and the world.

We are dedicated to fostering an open yet secure environment, balancing the safety of students, staff, and visitors with respect for individual rights, and safeguarding responsibilities.

HOW WE WORK

The ALU Team works in starkly different ways to traditional academic bureaucracies. We approach education from first principles, empower individuals to design, test, and implement creative new ideas, and work closely together to craft transformative learning experiences. We are deeply passionate about our students and excited by the challenge of building something entirely new.

The African Leadership University is committed to ensuring the safety and Well-being of all students under our care. As part of this commitment , we have a comprehensive safeguarding policy in place , which outlines our Zero-tolerance approach to any violation of safeguarding.

ROLE OVERVIEW

Own the tools. Build the infrastructure. Keep the engine running.

Department

Performance & Governance – Operational Excellence

Location

Remote (with collaboration across Rwanda, Mauritius and global functions)

Type

Internship – Full-time

Duration

6 months

Role Summary

The Digital Systems & Operations Intern is the technical backbone of the OPEX function. This role owns the configuration, maintenance, and continuous improvement of the tools and data infrastructure that the entire operational excellence team — and, by extension, the institution — relies on every day.

You will be the go-to person for Asana, Google Workspace, Slack, and any AI-powered productivity tools deployed by the team. You will build and maintain dashboards, keep the project portfolio updated with real-time actuals, ensure the institutional knowledge base is clean and accessible, and identify opportunities to automate repetitive work. You will work closely with the IT team and the ETO to ensure tool configurations support operational goals rather than create friction.

This is a role for someone who loves systems, moves fast, and finds genuine satisfaction in making things work better. If you have ever reorganized a chaotic shared drive and felt proud of it, this is your role.

Key Responsibilities

Asana Portfolio & Roadmap Management

• Own the OPEX Asana workspace: project structure, portfolio views, custom fields, rules, and automations.
• Maintain the strategic project portfolio with up-to-date actuals by assisting the project managers: milestone completions, RAG status updates, owner assignments, and dependencies .
• Update Asana with new tasks, sub-tasks, and projects arising from business reviews and team meetings — same day, without being asked.
• Build and maintain portfolio dashboards and reporting views that give leadership a real-time snapshot of strategic initiative health.
• Configure Asana automations to reduce manual data entry: auto-routing of tasks, deadline reminders, and status escalations.
• Ensure the tech roadmap workstream (OPEX-ETO collaboration) is accurately reflected in Asana at all times.

Google Workspace Architecture & Maintenance

• Own the OPEX team’s Google Drive: folder structure, naming conventions, access permissions, and version control.
• Lead the institutional shared drive cleanup initiative: audit existing folders, implement role-based access logic, and migrate content to the agreed-upon architecture.
• Build and maintain the OPEX team’s institutional wiki in Google Sites or Asana: process documentation, team templates, ways-of-working guides.
• Establish and enforce a clean, consistent file-naming and folder-structure standard that the wider organization can adopt.

AI Tools & Productivity Stack

• Configure, manage, and optimize the team’s AI notetaker (Gemini for Education or equivalent): meeting setup, speaker identification, output quality review.
• Review AI-generated meeting notes for accuracy before they are distributed. Correct errors. Ensure action items are extracted correctly.

Slack Optimization

• Audit the team’s Slack setup: channels, naming, integrations, notification settings.
• Configure Slack integrations with Asana and Google Calendar so key updates surface in the right channels automatically.
• Propose and implement a Slack channel structure and communication protocol for the OPEX team that reduces noise and improves signal.

Skills Required

Technical Skills

Soft Skills

Asana (project management, portfolio views, automations, reporting)

Extreme attention to detail — you notice when something is off

Google Workspace (Drive, Sheets, Sites, Docs, Slides, Calendar)

High sense of urgency without sacrificing accuracy

Slack (workspace administration, integrations, Workflow Builder)

Self-directed and proactive — you solve before being asked

AI notetaking tools (Gemini, Otter.ai, Fireflies, or equivalent)

Systems thinker — you see structure where others see chaos

Document formatting and institutional communication standards

Fast learner — you pick up new tools quickly and without frustration

Calm under pressure — things will break and you will fix them

Ownership orientation — when this role owns something, it is done well

Comfort with ambiguity — you build structure into unclear situations