Chicken or the Egg?
Students, landing that first job after you finish school can be tough. Many, daresay even most, employers will only hire someone with experience. But how do you get experience if no one will hire you, because you have no experience? Chicken or the egg? To sidestep this problem, I recommend getting an internship. This allows you to gain at least a little bit of experience, before you graduate and enter the full-time job market. The ideal setup would be to intern somewhere that you would actually want to work full-time. Then, once you graduate you can smoothly slide into a full-time position at whatever company or organization you interned at. One of my former coworkers did exactly this. He was an intern (worked a few days each week) while finishing school, then once he graduated he converted to a full-time engineer at that company. Many successful professionals launch their careers in this manner.
Learning On the Job
As an intern, you can learn some important things, like where the coffee pot is located and how to use the office copier and fax machine. Seriously, though, it allows you a chance to apply your academic training in the real professional world, solving actual problems that someone deems important enough to pay money for those solutions. It will help accustom you to the normal flow and rhythm of being a full-time working professional. It also opens your eyes to the wider world. I recall that during my first experiences as an intern, I was impressed by the qualifications of the professionals I was working alongside. These people were highly knowledgeable, highly experienced, well-versed in their professional specialties. Seeing such highly qualified professionals in the workforce definitely made an impression on me as a young student.
Internship Search
Now that I’ve hopefully sold you on the value of working an internship, how to get that internship? There is the standard first step of looking online. Look for companies in your professional field of interest, and search those sites for available internships. Even if they don’t have intern openings listed, there is no harm to contact their HR or careers office to ask about working there as an intern. Your school’s career center is also a good resource to help you look for internships.
Also, keep in mind the personal dimension. Use social media such as Linkedin to reach out to alumni from your school, and ask for their help in finding or applying to internships. About a year or two ago, a student at WPI (Worcester Polytechnic Institute – I earned my Master of Engineering degree in Biomedical Engineering from there about a decade ago) reached out to me asking for help finding an internship, because he saw that I was a WPI alumnus. Of course I was happy to help him.
Ask around among your friends and family, maybe they can point you to internship openings or refer you to professionals who can help you find internships. Be polite, be professional, and ask questions – this helps make a good impression on people. This way they will be more eager to help you.
No Limits
In your search, do not limit yourself to large companies or organizations. Often smaller companies have the most room for growth, while large companies are static behemoths that move glacially slow. Admittedly, large organizations will more often have formal intern programs that provide good mentoring and training. Smaller organizations sometimes may simply lack the resources to provide good formal training. However, it still does provide a valuable opportunity to learn on the job and get an inside look at your future profession, so do not discount smaller employers out of hand.
To all students reading this, good luck! To any professionals or educators out there, any comments or advice to students that you would like to add? Please leave a comment.