Life Post Graduation Part 1: Summer Internships

This time last year I was dreaming about life post-college and wondering what I’d be doing those first few months when I was no longer a student – for the first time in 12 years.

I thought about backpacking around Europe with friends, moving home and taking a mental health vacation before jumping into the real world, landing my dream job at a top-tier PR agency, or maybe even gearing up for a fall semester at grad school somewhere. There were lots of potential plans.

I never thought I’d be interning. By the time I graduated, I figured I’d have had enough internships to be ready to take on an entry-level position. Plus, I looked down on being an intern with a college degree. I thought it would be like wearing a neon sign around my neck: Meg Roberts – intern with a B.A., inadequately prepared for life in the real world.

I was very wrong.

My first summer as someone with a Bachelor’s degree just ended, and I spent my time interning with an excellent company in Washington, D.C – VOX Global Mandate. Now that my internship is nearing an end, I’m glad I got over being an intern snob. Interning after graduation was the perfect transition to full-fledged employee, and it was also incredibly rewarding.

Making the jump from my college town (and home state) to a different location was something I wanted to do, but that didn’t make it any less intimidating. Interning in a new city before landing a full-time position gave me a 3-6 month cushion to see if I even liked D.C. It allowed me to monitor my cost of living (which helped in that infamous salary negotiation conversation), and if I could handle the separation from family and friends. If I had hated D.C., it would have been okay for me to head home without feeling like I was quitting a job after only three months.

After graduation, I knew I wanted to leave Florida and try something new. Interning was a great first step in marketing my personal brand in a new town. While social media can help build a long-distance network, nothing beats genuine, face-to-face interaction. As an intern, my company allowed me to participate in numerous events where I was able to meet congressional members, other PR practitioners, journalists, and fellow social media fanatics. I’m not saying that this can’t happen in an entry-level position, but this helped me extend my job search once I was in D.C.

Holding a full-time internship is very different than popping into an office 2-4 days a week for a couple hours at a time. Because I was working every day for 8 hours (or sometimes 10), I got to see a lot of the behind-the-scenes grunt work that goes into public relations (or any industry!). I learned more about company culture and morale – two things any potential employee should consider before accepting a job offer. Since I was there all day, I got pulled into more meetings, worked on more projects, and got to know my colleagues better.

All of these things helped me realize that I chose the right career. But imagine if I found out I hated public relations – I’m the type of person that would feel very guilty about jumping ship, and would probably stay in the industry far longer than I wanted.

Coming into an internship with past experience helped, too. My executive team at VOX let me work on a variety of client projects once they saw that I was capable of pulling from my past internships and integrating them with the my new team’s knowledge. Now that I’ve been interning for a couple of months, I know that my previous work helped me get even more out of this current position.

This summer taught me that being an intern after graduation does not, in any way, reflect poorly on preparedness. So while interning wasn’t on my list of things-to-do-after-college, I’m very happy that it ended up being my plan and I hope others will see the benefits of graduate internships.

Just Relax: Questions That Make Interviews More Conversational

I think I’m one of the few people who enjoys interviews. This doesn’t mean I’m immune to the anxiety that comes along with them, but I look at interviews as conversations with people who are doing what I hope to be doing down the road. Shifting the framework about interviews not only helps ease the tension, but it will also helped me to learn more about the company and the industry.

From my experience (and I’ve had a lot of it in the past year), the key to changing attitudes about interviews is to be prepared. We’ve all heard it before: research the company and prepare questions. The latter has been invaluable – no matter what type of interview I had.

Having questions prepared is critical – and not to make you look better in the eyes of the interviewer, but to help you understand the company and the position better. Think of things you need to know about the company before agreeing to work there, and don’t be shy about asking the person interviewing you.

I have a list of questions I always pull from that match what is most important to me in a work environment:

• How is the company organized? How often do entry level employees interact with executive leadership?
• What’s the company’s vision for the future?
• How can my position help the company achieve its goals?
• Does your company have a mentorship program? Is it formal or informal?
• How does your company’s evaluation process work?
• Do you have professional development programs? What types?
• What is the typical career path for an entry level employee?
• How did you get to where you are now?
• How would you describe the culture here?
• How do you think your competition views you?
• What’s the ratio for teamwork versus individual work?

Most interviewers will cover key topics, but if they don’t, you should never leave an interview without asking the following:

• How many employees does the company have?
• What are the responsibilities of the position?
• Who does a person in this position report to?
• What are the next steps in this process?
• May I have your business card?

Not only do these help me understand the company and position more, but it also allows me to get to know the interviewer – who is most likely in a position that I’d like to be in one day. It always comes back to networking, people!

Whether an interview is for an internship, a job, a scholarship, or a promotion, the important thing to remember is that it should be a conversation that provides both parties with more information and a better understanding of who they might be hiring or where they could be working. Just think of it as another way to meet more people, and you should be able to breathe a little bit easier before your next interview.

A Reflection: 9/11

When I was younger, the numbers 9-1-1 had a very different meaning than they do now. The first things I used to think of were ambulances and fire trucks and the TV show Rescue 9-1-1. Every day since that disastrous September morning in 2001, 9-1-1 as an emergency number has been a secondary thought.

This morning as I sluggishly silenced my alarm and slowly remembered the date, I tried to recall the emotional ties I had to those numbers when I was little.

Emergency. Important. Urgency. Not to be taken lightly. Something you should never forget.

Isn’t it strange how those same words can be applied to 9/11?

Seeing those numbers now, even if it’s on a clock or a license plate, makes me think of the heartache, shock, confusion, loss, anger, and fear that we collectively felt that day seven years ago. More than that, I think of the deep levels of pain and despair that I will never know because I was not personally affected by the tragedy. My heart breaks for those whose lives changed forever when a loved one was lost in the twin towers, or at the Pentagon, or in a Pennsylvanian field. My thoughts and prayers also go to those heroes serving our country so that hopefully no one will ever have to experience that pain again.

There’s been a meme going around – where were you when you first heard – and for me, I was in the 100 building at Bishop Kenny High School in Jacksonville, Florida. It was my sophomore year and I was frustrated because our principal had just announced the bell would be held. I was in geometry. I hated geometry and despised the fact that it would be any longer than necessary.

As my classmates and I whined about the class extension, our teacher jumped form his seat at his computer and flew to the TV. Instantly, images of a tall buildings filled the screen, one had smoke billowing from it. We looked at him in shock – what were the kids in TV production class thinking? What kind of sick jokes was this? It’s September 11 not April 1…

But why was there a CNN logo at the bottom… this wasn’t a prank, was it?

Before we could even register what was happening, my friend pointed at the screen, yelling. “Is this happening right now? There’s another plane! What’s it doing, what’s it doing?!”

We all gasped as we watch the second tower get hit. No one spoke. My teacher turned up the volume and we listened intently – the anchor’s somber voice barely registering.

We continued with our day, moving from classroom to classroom as the bell rang, but we didn’t talk about American government or Spanish grammar or the periodic table. We watched the news continuously, we asked our teachers what was happening, we stared at them as they struggled to answer, we sat solemnly in the cafeteria, we called our parents in the hallway. No one scolded us for being on our cell phones. No one wanted to be upset over anything insignificant that day. No one had any answers. No one understood.

I still don’t understand the immense loss of that day, but I’ll never forget those numbers – 9/11 – and what they have meant to all of us the past seven years. Or what they’ll mean every year from now on…

Building Relationships: The Foundation for Good PR

For the past few weeks, the blogosphere has been home to a dynamic conversation about the necessity of public relations. I know this happens every now and then: someone says that hiring a PR shop is useless, and we in the profession come together to defend our honor. While I don’t appreciate the bashing, it does allow me to step back and evaluate my role as a public relations practitioner.

I can tell you one thing: I didn’t decide to pursue a career in public relations so that I could send out spam-like e-mails to bloggers and spend hours hounding reporters about my clients. Media relations is not what drew me into PR, and even though it’s valuable, it is not why I will stay in this field, either.

I chose PR for a number of reasons. I loved the idea that I could facilitate relationships between an organization and its consumers. Me? I like people. I like helping people. I like talking and engaging in informative conversations. I love writing and thinking strategically. All of these interests translated well into a career in PR, where these interests could become a valuable skill set.

Last night put a lot of things into perspective for me. I had a great time hanging out with Paull Young, Converseon employee and fellow PR blogger. Paull introduced me to some incredibly smart, hilarious people who all happen to have blogs. As we sat there talking and eating fried pickles (yeah, I know… but they’re actually good!), I realized why I love what I do.

The most rewarding part of my job is not landing a placement in the Wall Street Journal or on a top-tier blog. For me, the gold medal comes from meeting someone and trying to figure out how I can build a mutually beneficial relationship between that person and myself, and maybe down the road, between that person and my client.

And you know what? That’s what the people we’re trying to reach want, too. You know – the important people, the consumers. They want to interact with companies and organizations that seem personal, that at least try to understand the people using their products or services. The same goes with the media: if they know and trust you, they are going to be more inclined to work with you. This is simple Communications 101, yet it seems to get lost as we struggle to get large impressions numbers and prove our contributions to the bottom line.

When you really listen to others, you start to gauge their interests and passions – with this, you can gain their trust. Trust is the building block to relationships, and relationships should be the foundation of good PR.

If you are the CEO of a major company or the president of a new start-up, you might not have the time or resources to find the right people to build quality relationships with. That’s where we PR folk should come in handy – it’s what we do, or at least what we should do. As communicators, we have an onslaught of tools and tactics that can help create worthwhile relationships, whether it’s with consumers, journalists, bloggers, analysts, employees.

Even though measurement and proving our contributions is fundamental to the success of our profession, it will be easier to do so if we start acting a little more human and a little less like impressions fiends. Don’t get me wrong – I know the value of measurement! I’m simply agreeing with others in the field who are saying that the key to these numbers depends on strong relationships and excellent communications skills. It takes time, but so does the creation of any good foundation.