If you’ve already graduated from college, what is the best thing you did that helped you succeed in your first full time job? I bet if you did an internship during college, that would be your answer (providing you had a positive internship experience). It’s definitely my answer. Classroom teaching can only do so much. Getting real work experience with a company takes things to a whole new level.
I actually had positive and negative experiences with internships in college. I did one with a nonprofit called Girls on the Run that was absolutely awesome, and I got some great experience. I was also part of CMU’s on-campus, student-run PR firm called PR Central, and I got great real world experience providing PR services to local companies.
Unfortunately, the one PR agency internship I did during college was a complete disaster. My boss was awful (both as a person and PR professional), and she barely let me and the other interns do any real PR work. Several other incidents happened that I won’t get into, but basically I learned to always trust my gut and pay attention to red flags because if I had, I would have never accepted the internship offer.
So, what can you do to make sure you get a ton of value and find success with your next internship? We’ll be sharing plenty of advice related to that topic during the next Help a PR Pro Out (HAPPO) Twitter chat on Thursday, April 26 from 2-3 p.m. ET. Summer is coming up quickly, so this topic is very relevant for anyone looking to land a summer internship. If you’re not in the communications industry, you’ll still learn some important tips about scoring a great internship in any industry.
Here are some of the topics we’ll discuss during the chat:
- How people who have completed internships secured them.
- What students can do in the first few days of their summer internships to make a great impression on their team/supervisor.
- Ideal skills/qualifications students can pull from internships to put on their resumes.
To participate, all you have to do is log on to Twitter at 2 p.m. ET on the 26th and follow the #HAPPO hashtag. Also follow @helpaprproout and Pittsburgh HAPPO champ Deanna Ferrari (the moderator for this chat) to see the chat questions. Then, make sure you ask questions, interact with participants and share your thoughts and advice. I really like to use Tweetchat to do Twitter chats, so check it out beforehand to see if it will work for you.
Questions? Leave them here in the comments or ping me on Twitter – @nikki_little.
** If you live in Michigan and are in the communications industry, I’d love for you to subscribe to the bi-weekly HAPPO Michigan Report. Every other Wednesday (next one goes out May 2), I send out this e-newsletter that includes job openings, events, a featured job seeker and relevant/important posts or articles. Please and thank you!