What kind of work to expect at your internship

Unfortunately there’s not a simple one job fits all answer to such a question.  Internship programs and the types of work given to interns vary among different companies and often times are even different in the same company in different divisions or in different offices. If you search for “what type of work can I expect during my XXX internship” on google, you’ll find that you’d need to expect anything from being bored to death to being a coffee runner to running a multi-million dollar project.  In my few years working as the international internship program director, I’ve been able to see first hand how different those responsibilities can be even within the same industries. What you can expect is that there is definitely going to be a mix of things that an intern will be asked to do including the boring stuff.  I remember reading somewhere that it should almost be expected that students will be spending 20-50% of their time doing boring or routine tasks, and up to 50% of their time doing tasks that are perceived to be more challenging and therefore will seem to be more important.  Obviously this is not going to be the case in every company but hopefully it works as a general rule.

The reality is that even full time paid employees of a company spend some time during each week working on repetitive, boring or routine tasks.  In fact employees inevitably also have times when they have little work to do and are looking for ways to pass the time (think instant messaging or aimlessly surfing the web). Of course if you look for work to do you can always find it, but let’s face it, as humans we tend to take the easiest path, especially if the expectations of us are limited.  That means as we move up the career chain, we get more responsibilities, have much higher expectations of what we should be accomplishing and will have less time to be lazy. As an entrepreneur you pretty much start at the top so every moment is important and your motivated (hopefully) to be as productive as possible because you can’t afford the extra hands to sit around and do nothing.  This is just the way things go at work and should be expected especially in an internship. Don’t waste this time though, spend it researching, building a relationship with colleagues and learning more about the company, clients and industry.  Many intern supervisors agree that they are not only impressed but also appreciate when interns come to them with project ideas that they would be interested in working on. Remember, part of the internship experience is learning how to deal with those times when you have little to no work and motivating your self to finish those tasks that seem so insanely boring to do.

What are important tasks? It’s hard to have one set definition for what can be considered an important task.  What’s that saying? “One man’s trash is another man’s important task…” If a task is necessary to get a specific job or project completed, then that task should be considered important.  So what does the coffee you just picked up from Starbucks have to do with getting that new financial forecast finished? Just maybe, the coffee that you picked up for your manager was part of a daily routine that she needs every morning to be able to get the juices in her head flowing enough to create those amazing excel spread sheets. If she didn’t get that coffee, she would create flow charts that don’t flow and don’t convert that new lead into a new customer.  It’s your perspective, if you believe it’s important, than it is. One day you’re going to need to explain to your intern why getting a simple cup of joe for you is so damn  important for the success of the company.

I’m not trying to say that you should be expecting or accepting of just making snack runs all day, but you should realize that sometimes those tedious research projects, or document revising jobs are all part of an equation that makes up the whole.  Show your managers that you are efficient at getting even those routine jobs done well and you will be able to build up their confidence (in you) to land you those more game changing assignments.  Once you score the tough jobs, take time to understand what the requirements are and ask questions if you don’t understand something or ask for help if needed.  Your almost guaranteeing a boring internship by handing in results that don’t match expectations or worse yet, delivering an unfinished assignment.  Starting a first job requires working your way up the career path and an internship is no exception.  Be ready to handle whatever your managers throw at you, be open minded to learning from any opportunities that present themselves and have fun.  Your not getting paid (or getting paid very little), but an internship will reward you with a solid foundation to start a successful career path on.

Importance of becoming a shortcut, part 1

I was having a conversation with three of my friends and the topic of what we want people to say about us when we died came up.  My teacher friend said that he hoped that people would remember him as someone that made a difference in the lives of his students, and helped teach them to become great citizens of the globe and help make the world a better place. My judge friend hoped people remember her as someone who made a difference in the lives of women and children and helped to give them a voice.  (She’s a judge and was formerly the chief of the criminal division for the District Attorney’s Office, where she was responsible for prosecuting crimes against women, children, and the elderly.)

My third friend’s response; I hope they say, hey look he’s moving…..

Ok, so that was a joke I remember hearing somewhere, but I think it’s an interesting introduction into the topic i wanted to blog about today; The importance of becoming a shortcut.  In his book BE A SHORTCUT: The Secret Fast Track to Business Success (Wiley and Sons 2009), author Scott G. Halford explains that it is important for individuals to really focus and be good at a particular skill and therefore become a short cut or asset for those that they work with. This in fact is not only important on an individual level, but needs to transition across an entire organization. From individuals, to the teams, the company and in some cases across a corporation’s affiliates, everyone’s goals have to be similar in scope. Some companies are able to translate that into their brand’s slogan, i.e. Addida’s “nothing is impossible.” Other companies turn that into their vision.

For our company, Next Step Connections, our vision is to help students and young professionals towards reaching their career related aspirations. Whether it is from gaining experience through internships, building skills through workshops and events, learning entrepreneurship or assisting with assimilation into a foreign culture, our primary focus revolves around helping people find the right path to a successful professional career. Every team member at NSC is playing a role to help our participants find a way to improve their chances towards work related success. So on a personal level our intern placement manager’s goal is to find great company partners that will build meaningful internship opportunities for our internship candidates. While our program coordinators are on the ground, working face to face with each of our participants, helping with everything from orientation (ensure a smooth transition to this new and foreign culture) to leading monthly meetings (internship coaching sessions). Even our drivers who pick up participants at the air port, are important in delivering part of the customer experience and are aligned with our companies vision. Every individual in our organization is working to be a short cut to help our clients find their true career callings.

On page 66 of his book, Scott G. Halford writes “There are a lot of people who do a lot of things, but fewer people who do a few things exceptionally well. They are the masters. They are the ultimate shortcuts, because they are the ones we go to as our definitive resources in this world. That makes them worth a lot of money and gives them considerable influence.”  This not only makes sense for individuals, but also for organizations.  In order for companies to really succeed and thrive in this now global market, they have to really become great shortcuts for their clients.  For our company, that means we had to be careful with the number of products or services that we offered, even if they were in line with our companies vision.  Our core was and still is international internships, so we needed to make sure that we were the “master” professional program out there before we went out to build other offerings.   If your company seems to be struggling with a number of product offerings, maybe it’s time you got them to focus and become the premier shortcut in one offering first.

Choosing an international internship program

I was having dinner with some of our international internship participants the other night and really came away with some great insights that I thought would be worth sharing.

Every year we get a few interns who find us through google search and after a little research decide to apply. Of course this is something we are really happy about but we still wonder how they finally make the decision to commit. Most of our participants find us through their Universities career offices, through other programs that we partner with or through other references, but for these few, well let’s face it, they only know about us through our website.

For Robert the finance intern I was eating with, he said that he had spent almost 24 hours of time researching online before deciding to “take the leap” and pay the deposit to reserve his spot in our program. One thing that helped convince him was all the news and press he found about pay for internship programs that helped to prove that such services existed. Prior to finding our program he had never heard of such companies that offered those types of intern programs and so was skeptical and believed it could be a scam. Finding news about other programs legitimized our niche service area (there are benefits to having competitors) and helped convince him that we could be for real. He also mentioned that our videos that we posted, especially the one of Luca our finance intern in Shanghai in 2010 helped sway him to go for a similar internship experience with us. 

Another intern who also found us directly through online search mentioned that on top of the great details we include in our website, they were also convinced because of the fast and informative correspondence that she had with our program advisor. She explained that even though it was through email, the return time on answers to questions came in a “friendly, professional and timely manner.” And after an experience filled summer in China, she’s planning to go back to school and recommend us to her class mates.

For Ze, who happened to be a Chinese native studying in an overseas masters program also confirmed that the information that he was able to find online coupled with our professional email communication was helpful to help him decide we were a legitimate program.

And I remember quite a few of our past interns in 2009 who mentioned that it was after our phone calls with them or their parents, that they were able to put away most of their fears about whether someone was going to be at the airport to pick them up after their long flight over.  Imagine a  situation  where they not only were scammed of money but that they could land in a foreign country without knowing any of the language and having no other friends or family members on the ground to help.

The reason i think this is important to bring up is that even though we can say with confidence, and with the history of having over 300 students successfully finish one of our professional internship and other career related programs in China in the last 3 years, there are still some companies out there who are trying to use a flashy website to cheat people out of their money.  In fact, this year alone, I had 2 students contacting me directly in Shanghai from 2 different programs because they felt they were being cheated when they finally arrived.  One girl was rightfully upset because though the company that she had worked with was in Shanghai to pick her up, they had forgot to mention that they had not yet found her placement.  She had contacted me a few weeks into her stay and finally had to go and find her own placement.

So if you search and find any program online, including ours, make sure to do a little homework before you decide to spend any money and commit.  The amount of information that each person needs will vary, but with enough patience and determination, you’ll be able to find out what you need to ensure that you have found the right company to help you build that international experience that you have been dreaming about.  And if you have a gut feeling that a company looks shady, avoid them at all costs, or at least until you are able to put your concerns aside, as these types of companies give all of the other legitimate and quality programs a bad name.

high school entrepreneurs

These last few weeks we have been working hard on the program curriculum for our high school entrepreneur summer program which we are planning to offer for a second year in 2011. All these discussions we’ve been having about creating an amazing entrepreneurial experience in an international setting has really got me excited about the potential we can bring out of young students and so I wanted to do some research online to find some great stories to help inspire future business leaders.

The web is full of amazing stories featuring high school students that have took the initiative to start their own ventures. Some big, some small, but the idea of really starting something more than just that corner lemonade stand has really started to transcend to this younger generation.  It seems with the growth of the internet, young high school students have more resources available making it possible to do everything from planning an idea, to launching a full fledged service.  Just take a look at Diane Keng, at 18 she’s already the topic of several news articles and for good reason; she’s already launching her third start-up, myweboo.com.

According to Diane, “My age, my gender and my lack of experience don’t deter me from going after what I want for the company.”  This is the attitude that many high school students are displaying.  For these highly motivated few, a day could look something like this:  Get up and go to school, participate in after school activities and associations, go home to do homework and then spend a few hours on their own business.  On weekends, spend more time working, marketing, selling, implementing and tweeking.

For three 16 to 17 year old entrepreneurs from Canada, the drive to start their own business led them to the creation of a company called Design Vetica.  Alex Gondek, David Kim and William Zhou came up with their idea during IT class and were able to launch the interactive web design and media production company soon after.  Sometimes being so young actually keeps some barriers that slow down or even stop other older would be entrepreneurs from ever launching their ideas.  For instance, young kids have less to lose and have less responsibilities to worry about and are able to approach a start up with more of a care free and “just do it” attitude, while older generations have to worry about whether they can maintain a full time job (to pay the bills) while trying to keep up with the demands of starting and operating their own business.  Of course a can do attitude and is not all that is required in launching a successful company as these young teenagers can confirm.  For the few that are able to succeed, the drive to pull such a venture off includes the need to absorb as much about business as possible, learn from mistakes and to continue pushing along.  It might be natural then, to say that starting a business as a youth might be ideal, similar to what they say about learning languages; a young brain seems to be able to take in a great deal of information much more quickly and effectively than adults.

Whatever the reason, I do believe that it’s never too early to get some entrepreneurial experience and believe that the internet is probably the ideal medium that is lowering the barriers of entry. If you are a student and are interested in learning from actual entrepreneurs in Shanghai, check out Next Step Connections high school summer programs.  This is a chance to do something exciting and different next summer.

Networking with the best

Building a strong network is a key to success when it comes to starting a new business venture. This is true to pretty much all industries, however it makes even more sense when your core is to organize top placements for international internships in a foreign country like China.

Len Hayashi, one of Next Step Connections co-founders and current international internship program director landed in Shanghai in 1997 and spent a good 13 years building contacts in Shanghai.  This has proven to be fruitful.  Len knows most senior management of multinationals across various industries ranging from advertisement to Finance.

“I have to say that being well-connected in Shanghai and more so in the whole of China has played a major role in our fast growth. Since our start, we have been able to secure internship placements in large companies like McCann, Tesco, or AXA-Minmetals. This is also the main reason why we named our organization:  “Next Step Connections”; our participants benefit from our strong corporate connections in Shanghai and at the same time we encourage them to spend time growing their own network once they have landed here.” Says Mr. Hayashi.

Shanghai holds numerous networking events, some are effective, and some aren’t, but it takes more than spending hours exchanging business cards at public events to build a strong network.

Once you realize that you can actually meet people pretty much anywhere and at anytime; it becomes an interesting game. It’s all about being ready to open-up and taking the time to interact. You also need to be ready to step away from your comfort zone, as approaching people might seem intimidating at first.

According to the NSC co-founder, the concept of building connections comes with being ready to give first before eventually asking back for a favor.“ I always try to see how I can help people around, it’s all about doing a favor first” explains Mr. Hayashi.

Not only do you need to build a network but you also need to keep it alive, which can be quite time-consuming but once again crucial. “ You do not want to realize one day that your main contact is no longer working at the same company, you need to plan ahead to anticipate moves. Maintaining a strong corporate network requires a lot of strategy and planning.”

Anyone who has been living in China long enough knows that doing business without Guanxi is impossible. Guanxi is a central idea in Chinese society and is commonly translated as connections.