<p>Ok, so I applied for an internship at a law office (solo practice or very small practice-it's not a big firm or anything I think) last saturday and got a call on sunday morning. We had a very nice 10 minute conversation over the phone, he asked me some questions, I answered him, yadda yadda yadda. I thought I actually answered pretty smartly (not to be arrogant or anything). He wanted to speak to me in person, so I agreed to call him back on tuesday, and he gave me what I presume is his cellphone number.</p>
<p>I call tuesday and he tells me something came up so we'll have to reschedule. Ok, that's fine, turns out I had some scheduling conflicts as well. So I ask him if I should call him back 'tomorrow' which is today so we can set up another time and he tells me yes I should and we'll set up another time wednesday or thursday.</p>
<p>I call this afternoon, and he doesn't answer my phone call so I left him a message telling him when I'll be free for the rest of the week. I call once more about 5:30 hoping he'll answer the phone. He doesn't. </p>
<p>I don't know, is he blowing me off and hoping I'll go away because he wants or found someone else, or do you think he's really busy????? He seemed like he was happy with the answers I've given him over the phone on sunday....:( </p>
<p>What do I do? Should I give up and start sending out more resumes? Hang in there and keep calling back? This is the first time I've ever gotten this far in the process of applying for an internship (I applied for a couple last year but got absolutely no callbacks-not even a rejection phone call :( - at that point, I had given up completely ).</p>
<p>Stop calling! He’ll get back to you if he’s interested. You’ve crossed the line in calling him a second time in 1 day. People are busy and 24 hours is a respectable turn around time. So is 48 or 72 in this situation. The second call alone could cancel his interest.</p>
<p>Never count on 1 job. Of course you should continue sending out resumes.</p>
<p>Yeah, I admit that may have been a mistake on my part. But do you have any reason to suspect he had no interest in me in the first place? Because if that were true, I’d rather move on.</p>
<p>That’s an interesting perspective-I thought I’ll speak to you tomorrow meant I’ll speak to you tomorrow, not I’ll speak to you whenever I feel like answering the phone.</p>
<p>i dont know the specifics , but as someone onthe ‘other’ side --a business professional … Dont beat yourself up. I think you have to give it a rest, but it todays world it can get busy or hectic… try and be available if he does call back… and keep looking for others//but you didnt really do anything wrong</p>
<p>We have no idea what he’s thinking. Business people travel, they leave work for out of office meetings or to catch their kids’ games. Calling a few days later is often the case. When dealing with kids they need to know if they are high maintenance. You want to look low maintenance.</p>
<p>I agree, don’t beat yourself up. This is all preparation for when it really matters.</p>
<p>I’m almost ready to give up. I sent out several resumes over the past week and got no good replies (hell, I’ll settle for a reply of ANY KIND). And the one reply I got, it seems I screwed up. Seeing rejection after rejection after rejection is really depressing. Maybe I’ll try again when the economy recovers. Or just jump off my balcony (I’m kidding-I’m depressed but far from suicidal).</p>
<p>Maybe I’ll just spend the summer studying for the LSAT instead.</p>
<p>So…when do I call him back? 1 week? 2 weeks? A month (though by the end of April I would have given up completely)?</p>
<p>I would say a week… if about right. If money isnt an issue then look for a volunteer opportunity, for an internship… sounds like you want to go law, look for a pro bono law opportunity to copy run stuff down … etc </p>
<p>A week seems rather long to me… I would call now if nothing has changed in the past few days. A week might give the impression that you put it off or forgot about it.</p>
<p>I don’t think that by calling him twice you “screwed up”. They say that when someone wants to hire you, even if you don’t send the thank you, they will. I think that he may have gotten busy…I wouldn’t want to work for someone who doesn’t have the guts to tell you that the internship is not available. It is called communication! Good Luck!! It is rough out there this year!</p>
<p>I agree that if you can’t find a paid position, you can offer to volunteer at Legal Aid, Prosecutor’s Office, Public Defender, Attorney General, Civil Rights, or many other places. That can work to let you know how firms work and help you with recommendations down the line as well as possible job offers. Good luck!</p>
<p>-I finally got in touch with him, he’s been really busy apparently. And also had some medical issues.
-I got a callback from another internship (well they left a voicemail, I was away from the phone), and I called back and left a voicemail in which I sounded totally stupid, frazzled and completely nervous-err, lots of ums and uhs and pauses. Ugh, I’m so upset (particularly because this one happens to be at a fairly large multinational corp ). I guess I totally blew this one too. And now the waiting game begins, again. :(</p>
<p>So apparently, “please call me back” means “Call me back so I can ignore your phone calls.” I called the second person back about 4 times and left 2 messages, and it went to voicemail every time.</p>
<p>you need to calm down. . .attorneys are extremely busy! If you have to call back, leave a simple, professional msg saying “I am returning your call about the internship. Sorry I missed your call. You can reach me back at _____”. . .If you dont hear back a few days after that, call back and just say you were checking back with them. Whatever you do, don’t call back so much that you **** off the office staff. They will throw your msg in the trash and you will never hear back from anyone again. Trust me. . .it happens. ANOTHER HINT: YOUR MAIN problem seems to be that you don’t answer the phone when these people are calling you back. Why is that?? NEVER NEVER LEAVE YOUR PHONE if you really want this job. Not being rude but consider:</p>
<p>(1) Let’s face it, you are really there to LEARN and won’t be contributing a whole heck of a lot to the braintrust. So, they are kind of doing you a FAVOR by hiring you. (we’ve had interns. They are kind of like babysitting huge kids). . .So, it can kind of be an attitude of “well we could use them, but gawd they are alot of trouble” kind of thing) </p>
<p>(2) And furthermore, you are probably not the only person they are considering. They dont have time to chase you around. They have more important–and money making–things to do.</p>
<p>So, ANSWER YOUR PHONE. If you are on a date, on the toilet, getting groceries, WHAT EVER. ANSWER THE PHONE!!!1</p>