Students ‘Rev Up’ careers with Internship Week
Students are learning the important skills needed to get an internship this week at the Huntsman School of Business annual Internship Kick-off Week with a race car theme called “Rev Up Your Career.”
“Students can start honing skills and investigating internships,” Krystn Clark, director of Internship Programs at the business school, said.
Obtaining an internship may not be as simple as racing a miniature remote-controlled car around a track in the Business Building commons as students did Tuesday, but the business school’s Global Enrichment, Internship Programs and Career Acceleration offices, who sponsor the event, say they can certainly help make it easier.
Brian Holt, a senior majoring in operations management who interned last summer for global conglomerate Tata Chemicals, said the help he received on resumé writing and negotiating made a huge difference in the application process.
“It sped things along so that I solidified my internship sooner,” he said.
Holt said he learned key communication skills while interning and also found the internship through networking.
Communication, networking, listening and having a confident, professional manner are among the soft skills, also known as human capital, Clark said are great to learn by interning, no matter if it has anything to do with a student’s major or not.
“Students shouldn’t be limited to their major,” Clark said, adding that everyone needs to develop soft skills in order to get a head start in their career.
When the recession set in, job searches got harder, said Barbara Sidwell, senior career acceleration specialist at the Career Acceleration Center.
“Students need to develop a sense of resilience that not everything is going to go your way,” Sidwell said. “Students are realizing these are essential skills to develop.”
Liz Allred, director of the Global Enrichment program said, an internship with a global perspective is now almost necessary to succeed in the job market after college.
“The global study abroad program gives students a business perspective,” she said. “All the students coming back from these trips are transformed. They see their classroom in a different way. They develop language skills and see how other cultures work,” Sidwell said.
She said an example would be someone who gets a job in human resources. If it’s a global company, as many are, students need to understand how the company works within other cultures, she said.
Kati Nilson, a USU graduate who now works as program coordinator for the Global Enrichment program, said studying abroad helped her unravel what she can do with her life.
“I didn’t know I had opportunities,” she said.
Clark said her office has been pretty successful at getting students internships. Last year over 400 undergraduates alone earned internship credit. Clark said those numbers are increasing every year.
Clark said the internships and career programs aren’t aimed at replacing USU’s Career Services, which they work with with quite often. Rather, they want to fill a different role for business students.
“What we’re trying to show is that as a school we are unified and approachable,” Clark said.
– la.stewart@aggiemail.usu.edu