“The only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it.” –Steve Jobs
The Great Recession crushed the American economy from 2007 to 2009 and did not discriminate on any individuals. Those who thought they had job security were unfortunately mistaken and those seeking jobs were trodden. There seemed to be little that anyone could do to better their chances of acquiring a job in the economy we were experiencing. So with the search for a better life and a hopeful future, many people began to get creative with insuring their success when the recession finally came to an end. A new system that would offer pay as well as build a strong résumé for future employment.
Instead of focusing on an immediate career, people began focusing on the right experience to build up to the right job. “Internships provided a well-marked road to employment without the risk of looking for a job. By the eve of the Great Recession, internships had become the preferred path to success. NACE (National Association of Colleges and Employers) reports that, from the mid-1980s to the mid-2000s, the share of college graduates participating in at least one internship rose from less than 10 percent to over 80 percent. Meanwhile, the share who got their first full-time post-graduation job through an internship rose from 5 to 30 percent” (Forbes.com). However, there’s more to internships than possibly securing a job and building a successful résumé. Internships allow individuals to experience the corporate culture of the field they are considering. Individuals are able to assess the ethics, behaviors, corporate leadership, and evaluate the company standards that they feel they best fit in to. Allowing oneself to become familiar with the values of the company is incredibly important to the future-impact of the individual. Gaining valuable work experience by understanding corporate culture is just as important as learning how to successfully network.
One of the most important realizations from an internship is if that company or industry is something you want to do as a long-term career. “Internships may also serve the purpose of turning an intern off of a particular career, as you really don’t know whether you have a passion for a field of study before you get some experience in that field. Use that internship to make your resume impressive, but also consider the experience a try-out for your chosen field of study” (scholarships.com). Together, we have had 5 internships with different companies and different industries, all being great learning experiences for several different reasons. What was most important about each internship was that they helped us realize what we liked to actively engage ourselves in. In our first corporate experiences, the knowledge we gained on what it meant to be business professionals and how to conduct ourselves in stressful situations proved to be indispensable. We had great success, learning under truly brilliant sales professionals that taught us the skills that we still use today. Being able to handle the stress of balancing out work, school, and relationships would prove valuable in the long run as these skills would later on become stepping stones for our future successes.
Our current internship is at a growing consulting firm, creating a nice change of pace. Our previous internships were for multi-billion dollar giants, making the culture very impersonalized. Not once did we ever feel like we were part of a team or that we were valued, mostly due to the fact that their scale of operations were so vast and the emphasis on employee engagement was not valued. Still in the growing phases, Heartland IT Consulting has shown us what it means to be valued and to be a part of a real team. Our job satisfaction has sky-rocketed since working here and the value of our work has gone up because of the simple fact that we love the work that we accomplish. The environment has been incredibly welcoming to millennials like ourselves and our fellow interns, with every member of the company truly appreciating our work and effort. There is no “millennial shaming” here, and the CEO works side-by-side with us, never making us feel alone or too afraid to make a mistake. Every team member is there to help us and there is no such thing as closed-doors here at HITC. Everyone is available for questions and everyone is willing to help anyone. The training material, processes, skills, ethics, values, leadership, relationship building, and incredible employee engagement has proved to be invaluable to our lives and our future endeavors.
Our internship at Heartland has helped us realize what we want in our lives and what will help us grow. The other internships were valuable because we figured out what we did not want in our future careers. Heartland has taught us what it takes to be in a successful team and what it means to be valued. We learned that if you enjoy where you work, in whatever role you are in, you will succeed. Because like Steve Jobs said, “The only way to do great work is to love what you do.”
Blog Written by:
James Gonzales and Kevin Miller
2015 Heartland Interns
