Start Interning in Your Teens. Here's Why

There is more to the summer holidays than Star Wars marathons and swimming all day long. You can find an internship and watch an exclusive trailer of what life holds for you. Internships may sound all serious and boring, but they are a lot of fun and extremely valuable if you know how to land the one you are interested in.

But, why even do an internship when you can start studying the syllabus for the coming year or, practically speaking, chill for two months in front of the television?

Internships have innumerable benefits, so much so that we can categorise them based on when they will materialise:

Short term benefits

When you go to the office for a month or two and see how professionals work, you finally understand what it means to be a financial analyst or junior chef or content writer. At this age, your version of a career is solely based on what you have seen in movies or heard about from relatively elder people around you, and that is never enough to commit yourself to something. The movies make it more exciting than it might be and people only want to crib about things. An internship will give you an unbiased glimpse into what it is that you think you want to do.

With this you develop some on-the-job skills and identify the skills you will be required to master but the school never gave enough time for. Being good with math isn’t enough to become a mathematics professor, you need to be a good teacher and be able to plan and guide your students. But how would you know that before stepping onto the battlefield? Internships make you aware of everything apart from the academics you will need to focus on in college so that when you start looking for a real job, you are prepared for it.

You will finally be able to see the relevance of what you have been learning. It can be demotivating to study for years and years before seeing where and how you apply all those theories which seem redundant. An internship will help you connect the dots in the never-ending process of learning and give your academics a sense of purpose.

High school students aren’t expected to have work experience (one can only wonder why), so some solid internships on your resume serve as an indicator of your seriousness or discipline. But even before that, to get an internship you will first need to make a resume. Many students don’t give their CV any importance until they apply for a job in their third year, and as a result, their first CV is just a desperate, messy attempt at selling themselves. Building a resume seems easy but it’s very difficult to convey everything you want through one informative sheet. Thus, the earlier you focus on this, the better you can maximise the limited advertising space you get.

Long term benefits

You won’t need to scroll endlessly on LinkedIn from your college dorm to network if you were working with a company in your high school. Networking seems like an irritating chore but it will be very helpful later on when you finish college and realize your degree is pretty pointless. While at an internship, you might also find a mentor who can guide you through your college and into the job market. A mentor shows you direction and that’s all you need as lost teenagers.

Probably the most enticing advantage for eleventh and twelfth graders is the story an internship can give you for your college applications. You can add a spark to your humdrum please-accept-me essays by talking about how you worked with this huge company last summer and share whatever it is that you learned there. And when you want to apply for scholarships, these experiences can be game-changing. Not every student has had internships in their past when they could have just lazed around.

For all you know, you might be such a valuable employee to the company that you’ll be offered a job on completing your graduation. All these listed companies view their employees as assets and thus they are willing to invest in you. And if not that, then whenever in the future you’re looking for jobs yourself, the recruiters would prefer candidates with such summer internships over candidates who remember all the dialogues of The Empire Strikes Back.

Now that we have established the relevance of an internship, let’s look at how to get one in the top companies.

Getting an internship sounds easier than it is. Not everyone’s parents work in the Big Four and thus you will have to knock on a lot of doors before someone lets you in. But this doesn’t mean you don’t ask for your parents’ or your friends’ parents’ help. They might know someone who knows someone who can press a few buttons and set you up. Ask for help whenever you’re stuck.

Keep an eye on the websites of the companies you would want to intern at. Every now and then they run these internship programs that you can enrol in. Also, your school might have contacts/partners and your school can vouch for how hardworking you are (hopefully) and arrange a meeting for you.

When all that fails and you find yourself stranded, you can start sending cold emails to the HR department of these companies (sorry, you can’t just slide into their DMs here). Sending an email is a tricky business, as they receive tons of them all day long so you need to make yours interesting and concise, don’t beat around the bush but give something worth their time.

How though?

Research as deep as you can about the company. Read about their work, where they plan on taking the company, any new clients they have started serving, what news stories they come in, and anything that concerns them. You aren’t doing this to flatter them or hone stalking skills, but to show your level of commitment and to know what you are signing up for.

When you write them an email, asking for an internship, don’t say you will add value in whichever capacity possible. That just makes you sound outright confused and no one wants confused people on their team. Be specific about what you can offer to the company, which department do you prefer to work for and what you are looking to learn in the time you are there while also hinting that irrespective of where they place you, you’ll be glad to work with them. You need to be flexible but also show what you are capable of contributing.

But just suitable words and witty one-liners won’t be enough. You must start working for the company before you are offered anything. This might be difficult to do when the firm works behind the doors and there’s little to no information about their operations but that’s unlikely. If it’s a brand consultancy firm and you know they have just signed a new company, make innovative product launch campaigns or a new logo for them or write a TV commercial for them. Whatever you do, send it along with the mail and show how outgoing you are and that you have ideas that are worth giving you a seat at the table.

Don’t feel ashamed to give “gentle reminders” as you might have loads of time to kill, but they are swamped with work and it becomes easy to miss out on emails from enthusiastic teenagers. That’s why what you write and send in the mail holds so much importance.

Internships go a long way. Even if it's unpaid, grab any opportunity you get. Come to think about it, why would a large, well-established business want to pay a kid they will need to teach but can’t even have on the team for long because you don’t even know what you want to study ahead. And even if it isn’t a famous multinational company but a local firm that offers you an internship, take it. For these smaller organisations will let you witness how businesses work and grow and you are more likely to work with multiple departments here.

Don’t take internships that enhance your resume but you have no interest in what they expect from you. Yes, experience is important but it’s even more important to enjoy yourself constructively. You are still young and it only gets tougher when you grow up. So, find a gig that you are excited about and will want to go for every day.

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