Summer internship season will be here before we know it, and there are several things needed to prepare for the successful summer.
VALLEY asked several students about their experiences and advice to help others prepare for the upcoming application season.
Jamie Burton is a senior studying journalism. This past summer Burton was a production intern for The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon in New York City. This has been a dream internship for her since high school, and her time at Jimmy Fallon was extremely memorable.
“My advice is for people to use personal experiences when answering questions, because that makes you more memorable and those experiences help them get to know you better,” says Burton.
This is a technique called using STAR responses. STAR stands for Situation, Task, Action and Result. This helps interviewers see your thought process and personality through real life experiences that have come to you — either a challenge or a major success.
Often times, STAR questions have a specific prompt, “Tell me about a time when … ” so don’t be afraid to share something personal because that will help you stand out, as Burton says.
Kristi Chan was a digital intern for Hudson’s Bay Company in NYC this past summer, which is the company that owns Saks Fifth Ave and Saks OFF5th.
Her goal was to find an internship in Manhattan, so she new her Hudson’s Bay internship was the right fit for her.
“It was an awesome experience getting to see what it’s really like and has made me look forward to going back to NYC after graduation,” says Chan.
Some of the advice she wants to give to students is to be persistent with the search.
“It can be a long and sometimes tedious process, but when you have a vision in mind, I promise it’ll pay off. I didn’t get my internship offer until early May after I was already home for the year,” says Chan.
Kristi’s favorite part about her internship was getting to be in the city and work with other interns and executives in a corporate setting.
Other advice is to keep your resume consistent — all of the margins should line up and everything should be easy to read. Your resume should always be targeted towards that type of internship, so having more than one different type of resume may come in use. To read more, indeed.com provides 10 helpful tips for resumes.
Another thing students can do is look on LinkedIn for job postings. Using your networking will never hurt you, and you never know what opportunities might come up. Keeping an updated LinkedIn is an important part to the internship search. College InfoGeek provides ways for students to make their LinkedIns stand out and be more professional.
Websites such as indeed.com and internships.com are good places to look as well.
The most important thing for students to take away is to not give up, although there will be “no”s in the process, there will also be a “yes.”
