Of all the applications we receive, the only typology that exceeds those seeking employment are those seeking internships. Both types stem from youthful exuberance about the work we showcase on our website and the eagerness to get involved in the career of their dreams.
Marketing is probably one of the most popular job options, especially since it can represent so many avenues of creativity and personal challenge, not to mention financial reward. For a young person dealing with the responsibilities of meeting college requirements and concentrating on a lifelong career, it’s not hard to understand why a marketing internship sounds so appealing. Yet with visions of Hollywood glamor dancing in their heads, few students find the optimal internship experience they’re looking for.
The ideal internship is not only few and far between, but it is now more common to find that it now rarely offers pay for the efforts of today’s students. In fact, with the unemployment rate within this age group hovering near 20%, it has become increasingly common for some internships to require students to pay a fee to apply and, if selected, to pay even more to participate. . Additionally, while a good number of internships offer positions but no pay, another variety of internships are described as “virtual,” meaning that students participate from their own location, bypassing the usual need to travel halfway around the world to what is truly coveted. worldly experience.
From the company’s point of view, internships can be a waste of corporate time, creative effort, and production disruption, but they are offered as a way to reinforce positive public relations and company benevolence. After all, the conscientious business environment that welcomes fellows into its hallowed bastions of concept and creation would hardly want to leave a sour taste in the mouths of these hungry babies, hoping they will return home with stories of satisfaction and fervor, delivering the company’s preferred message to the intended audience target market.
However, that’s not the only reason some companies encourage internships. For some, it’s a way to capitalize on youthful energy to fill the need to fill a position for little or no money. These are often the programs that give internships a bad name. Student accounts of time spent running bland errands or acting as staff “hunters” do little to instill confidence in the hearts of diligent candidates and, by extension, paying parents.
That brings us to our program, which turns out to be a virtual internship, neither student-paid nor free, but of significant substance and desirable reputation. Although it was once offered free of charge due to the generosity of our entrepreneurial spirit, unfortunately the lack of available time changed our policy. While applying students must meet rigorous standards of academic performance and ability, the range of possibilities for the internship focus is virtually limitless, as the student can choose from any number of marketing assignments, involving visual applications or textual, can be self-generated or dictated. by our company, and we offer focused and individual attention from an experienced and successful expert in the field. Candidates should be able to communicate via email on a professional level with our company’s internship advisor, submitting completed work for review at specifically scheduled intervals. To qualify for school credit and completion of the internship, our company must also report the student’s progress to the school advisor with a full evaluation of overall performance to conclude the experience.
The first student to apply was in his junior year at the University of California at Berkeley. Of Asian descent with English as a second language, he stated that although he could apply for school credits, he was not interested in that aspect of the internship. Rather, he wanted to study marketing with a professional who could help prepare him for his ultimate goal: developing an innovative product to benefit humanity in third-world countries where clean drinking water was in short supply and a critical issue for survival. His invention was a bottle that purified all contaminants from any water source, including seawater, through a series of filters and could be easily transported, reused multiple times, and affordable for the poverty-stricken masses who could use it. . His plan after graduation was to start a company financed by investors and a family, manufacturing in South America and shipping to Africa and Asia, where he would market the product and organize a donation program through various global organizations such as the Cross. Red. With maturity and behavior of the highest caliber, this student was clearly out of the ordinary, obediently fulfilling all our requests on time and with evident diligence. However, with a full course load, he delivered internship projects once a week, developing with our guidance the product name, logo, and tagline, along with a billboard for outdoor and internet use. Since you ultimately needed to present your concept to the investment community, we recommended preparing a business plan for which you needed to present your product, its benefits, its construction, and its scientific documentation and proof of authenticity, as well as researching all costs. projected start-up periods, followed by revenue projections for the initial periods of operation. During these exercises, it became increasingly apparent that his “invention” already existed and was being actively marketed on a global scale by major corporate entities, revealing the enormous expense involved in bringing such a product to market, and making this internship more of a learning experience than a real precursor to a lifelong career path. Disappointed but never discouraged, he opted to end the internship after five months of concerted effort by informing us that he had been accepted into a new program at the site where he could follow his evolving interest. In a recent email, he wrote:
“I have not been able to launch my vision due to similar products on the market, but my internship with you has led me to become interested in environmental economics and public health. I will be working this summer for an organization that installs solar panels inside rural villages in the Philippines I just wanted to thank you guys for your mentorship which has certainly played a big part in getting me here.”
The second student to apply was a junior at the State University of New York at Albany, the daughter of a client, interested in marketing. Although such a scenario might suggest preferential treatment, nothing could be further from the truth. Considering her school’s meticulous internship standards and her father’s career goals for her, we knew our most disciplined and uncompromising effort would be expected. But unlike our first student, she needed to be told exactly what was expected of her, from the content of the program to the strict deadline. As a communication major, she chose to apply her writing skills to a series of six lengthy articles on a variety of topics that we proposed. Somewhat disillusioned with his lack of command of the English language, to say the least, we spent six weeks of arduous editing, rewriting instructions, explanations of errors and correct usage, further editing, and the need for more rewrites, concluding each episode as a “stunning experience.” learning” with the goal of honing your efforts on the next topic. For a student to submit to such unrelenting criticism inside a free internship that would earn her nothing more than a few school credits that she probably had no monetary appreciation for since her father was obviously footing the college bill, she deserved a lot of credit for keeping his composition. , pleasant disposition and polite and grateful attitude at all times. In fact, when we finally finished the final article, which was certainly an improvement over the others, but was still plagued by the same previously fixed bugs, we were forced to report the entire less-than-perfect experience to your school counselor. like her father when she asked him. Shocked to learn from both sources that this student has a severe learning disability, they told us that they viewed the internship as a great success. Since we had never been told of this condition, we wondered if we had been too harsh on her, but by consensus of opinion, we believed that we had acted professionally and managed to raise her performance to a higher level than everyone thought possible. . Her last thank you note touched our hearts.
“Your comments to my advisor were very sweet and I appreciate your kind words. I am truly grateful for all your efforts on my behalf. Thank you for helping me become a better writer.”
So, who benefits more, intern or company? Of the two student internships reviewed above, I think we delivered something valuable for which we were rightly commended. But from our point of view, there is no greater honor than to see the fruits of our efforts contributing to the development of a young mind for whom the future is so promising.