Do I NEED an interneship?

<p>So I'm a psychology major with a minor in business administration and Japanese. I was just wondering if an internship is essential in order to get in a job in the business field nowadays. And if it is, when is a good time to pursue one? I'm currently a junior in college btw. Any help would be appreciated!</p>

<p>With so many recent graduates having a tough time finding jobs in their fields, internships make a great deal of sense. It adds to your resume, helps you build a professional network, and provides invaluable experience about the kind of work you do and don’t want to do. But because many businesses have cut back on their summer hiring programs, working for free is often the only option (which means kids from low income families are going to suffer since that’s a luxury they can’t afford).</p>

<p>Assuming you can work for free, you certainly should find something for the summer, and if there is a particular area of business you are interested in, getting some experience by working part-time over the school year is also a good idea. </p>

<p>How do you do this? Start with your career center and talk to them. Use the alumni network at your school to do informational interviewing and make contacts in your area(s) of interest. Use your network of contacts (your friend’s parents, your parent’s friends, your relatives, your profs, your former teachers, anyone you’ve worked for previously, neighbors) to identify people in the field you are interested in exploring and make sure they know you are looking for opportunities. Contact area nonprofits that have a mission that resonates with you and offer to volunteer in one of the business functions - marketing, finance, development, program management, human resources or IT. Know that if you are unpaid when you start, and you do a great job, you will be first in line when there is money to hire.</p>

<p>Good luck! It’s a tough market, but you only need one job/internship.</p>

<p>Yes you need one and the best time is now. If you can get some experience over the spring semester great; doing something useful in the summer is an absolute must. </p>

<p>I agree with M’s Mom as long as her last statement means that you only need one job/internship <em>when you graduate</em>. Multiple experiences while an undergrad are becoming much more common and I recommend you get as much work experience as you can.</p>

<p>Awesome advice so far guys thanks! So I’ve noticed that many friends of mine will finish college first and then do a summer internship as a senior directly after they have graduated. Would you consider this to be too late or should I do it while I am in still in school? Also,
I’m not exactly sure what field of business I want to go into yet. I’m a very sociable, people person that likes networking and such. Do you think marketing would be a good fit for me?</p>

<p>It’s competitive just to get an internship - especially a paid internship - so the longer you wait, the tougher it’ll be. (You’ll be competing to get that internship with other students who already have more experience than you.) </p>

<p>One of the things you MIGHT consider, instead of an internship, is to really focus on your Japanese. The better you are in Japanese, the more interesting a candidate you will be to American companies doing business in Japan and vice versa. Maybe look into going to Japan for a summer/semester of intense language study? Then you can really sell your language skills to prospective employers - it’s a unique advantage. </p>

<p>My other thought is that right now your background is all over the board. You’re a psychology major with two minors. Which means you basically have enough courses in psych to call that a major, and a smattering of classes in business and Japanese. That seems a bit unfocused (it’s not like anyone cares much about minors, especially if there are two of them.)</p>

<p>Your friends who finish college first and then do a summer internship are doing the internship because they can’t find a permanent job. </p>

<p>You should talk to your career services office to get some advice on what business careers match your interests and abilities. That’s also where you’ll get help landing an internship.</p>

<p>Internships help, A LOT. For example, I-Banking(An exclusive and prominent career in business), often times has ivy league kids competing for jobs during their junior years of college. The ones that have the most/best internships often are given interviews and chances, those without any are dropped from consideration immediately.
Business is a vocation in literal terms, it is impossible to be truly considered good at it without DOING it. Just like a vocational school has shop classes, you can learn about the ins and outs of building all day, but you can’t be considered adept unless you build something yourself.</p>

<p>Wow this is excellent advice guys, thanks for all the feedback. I’m going to talk to my advisers and career center to see if they could possibly hook me up with something during the year so I can get as much experience as possible.</p>

<p>And to follow up with your concern (katliamom) I know it may seem a bit unfocused, but I do have a plan it’s not just random classes being taken. I initially wanted to become a clinical or industrial psychologist because I LOVE working with people and always found myself to be the one who peers felt comfortable confiding in. I was on track to do this until my family realized that our financial struggles would mean that going to grad school to get my Psy. D would become extremely costly and unrealistic for me to pay. At this point (my second semester as a sophomore) I realized that I also loved the field of business having run my own website and taken a few marketing/management classes. It was at this point that I thought that business was quite an attractive option for me too, considering the money and opportunities you could come across if you excel at your job. So I decided to take up Japanese too because I’m from Hawaii and the touring population here is LARGELY Japanese. So if you pair psychology, which helps you to understand people a lot better, with business and Japanese, I felt that I could be an attractive candidate to work in the marketing field or the HBM field. </p>

<p>I’m still thinking about a possible career as a psychologist, but it’s never bad to have a backup plan. If I wasn’t taking all these business and Japanese classes, I’d be taking useless general education credits just to get by. Why not make the most out of your education right? After all I am paying about $20,000 a year lol.</p>

<p>Although not “essential,” I would highly recommend doing an internship. You get out into the field, and if you do well, you’ll most likely have a job offer waiting for you when you finish school.</p>

<p>Is there a difference between an internship and volunteering? Because I have a friend who’s dad is the regional manager at a big company and he said that we can come in for summer to volunteer up to 20 hours a week and he’ll pay us under the table so it would work out great for both of us.</p>

<p>With an internship, there is the implied commitment to provide an educational experience in exchange for the work. Volunteer work can include this but doesn’t necessarily - I don’t think the implied commitment to train, mentor or develop is there. Others would argue that this is just semantics. The key is to be clear about what you’ll be doing and what kind of investment the organization is making in you.</p>

<p>And yes, lynxinsider, you only need one job when you graduate - but a wide variety of work experiences is both helpful in figuring out what you want to do, and what you don’t want to do.</p>

<p>Interesting. Well yeah I’m looking at the marketing/sales area of business but I really don’t know where to start!! Any suggestions?</p>

<p>You should talk to a counselor at your college. He or she will be able to tell you which companies are offering what in your region and will be able to point you in the right direction.</p>

<p>Or contact the marketing dept. or the development dept. of your school and see if they would like an intern. Colleges vary greatly in the level of sophistication they bring to marketing themselves and to their fund-raising - but as a newbie you can learn a lot even in a less sophisticated environment.</p>

<p>Very true. I will contact them as soon as I get back. Another career that has sparked my interest is Financial Adviser/Planner. I like the idea of networking, marketing yourself, and I’ve always been good in sales positions for previous jobs.</p>