Internship Takeaways

As internships come to a close, there are things you need to make sure that you don’t leave behind. Here are some things to take with you:

1. Letters of Recommendation – if you have had a good relationship with your supervisor(s), you should definitely ask them for a letter early enough so that you can leave with it. You don’t want to ask for it on your last day because then you either have to come back to pick it up or follow-up to make sure it gets completed. People are busy so sometimes it’s “out of sight out of mind.”
2. Sense of your New Skill Sets – you should really be able to discuss in clear detail what you have learned from your internship experience and career specific skills you have acquired (e.g., specialized software skills, technical skills, awareness of industry trends, etc.)
3. Areas of Improvement – areas that you need to focus on with your education and further internship experiences. These may be skills that you noticed that you lack or that your supervisor may have mentioned.
4. New Contacts – you want to add on your LinkedIn account, all the new contacts that you made while at your internship which include not only supervisors, but other interns and employees.
5. A Plan for the Next Internship or Job – your internship should help inform you about what comes next. You should now have a greater sense of what you would like to do in your industry and what you’d rather not. It may also help you to decide that this is not the industry for you–which means that you may need to rethink your major or career plans.