Internship Evaluations

What do our interns learn?

How do they evaluate their internship experience?

Here are a few comments…

Michaela St. Onge, Lafayette College '10

What professional skills did you learn during this internship that you feel will help you further in college and in your career?

Professional emailing—much different than emailing a friend to say hi. Learned the need to be clear and concise, especially when pitching to editors. Learned in general how important it is to respond to emails, and how to close out emails depending who you are contacting.
Time management—learned to work efficiently and with deadlines.
Editing skills—although I came into this internship with experience in editing, my editing (and writing) skills were definitely strengthened
How to position yourself as an expert (thoughtleading)—regularly publish articles, get a book published, and land speaking engagements.

What career insights did you gain that you feel will help you be successful in your eventual career?

I think the most critical thing I learned that will help me succeed in the future is the importance of networking. I had never really given its importance much thought, but now I see how pivotal it is. The whole process doesn’t have to be all that difficult either; swapping business cards can lead to a career-long relationship. At first I didn’t see why sending out a monthly newsletter to a 500 person long email list was important…but now I do! And it makes perfect sense—even if people aren’t necessarily reading the newsletter, they are seeing your name each month, preventing them from forgetting about you.

Also, I learned the importance and benefits of regularly writing and publishing articles. If, down the road, I want to position myself as an expert thoughtleader in whatever field I may be in, I will need to regularly publish articles. Thanks to my summer here, I will know just how to go about doing that.

What did you NOT learn about that you wish you had?

I didn’t come into this internship knowing what to expect, or what I would learn, so this question is tough. If I had to say one thing I wish I experienced or learned, I think it would be being a part of the initial brainstorming of potential article ideas that Ken goes through with a client looking to publish articles. Although I did formulate several article ideas lists for clients based on the thoughts and ideas previously discussed by the client and Ken, I feel as though I didn’t get any experience with the actual first step of deciding to write and publish articles: brainstorming article ideas with the client.

What aspects of the internship did you enjoy?

My favorite part of the internship was editing articles for clients. Some articles definitely needed more work than others, but I nonetheless enjoyed the challenge. Taking a look at a person’s writing for the first time, the objectivity helped me to not hold back on my initial thoughts for how the article could be improved with editing. Whether I was adding things in, taking things out, reworking an entire paragraph, or just changing a word, I felt as though I was really helping the client by clarifying their thoughts and strengthening their writing.

I also enjoyed participating in the IMC roundtable events on getting books and articles published. Because the events were held toward the end of the internship, I felt totally confident speaking about certain details of the processes, as I had been learning about getting books and articles published throughout the entire summer. I liked that Ken had Charlotte and I say a few words, and felt as though the people attending the roundtables were really listening to what we had to say.

Oh, and I, of course, loved all the field trips around historic Concord !

How could this internship be improved?

I don’t have any ideas—sorry! I really got a lot out of my experience here at emerson consulting group, and don’t have any suggestions for how the internship could be improved. Two months was a good amount of time, and four days a week was perfect. I liked the hours too—we have the rest of our lives to wake up early and go to work, so the start time of 10 am was perfect.

How could the “freezer” (room you worked in) be made over to improve its working environment?

Hmm, well this room looks like it hasn’t been touched since the eighties—which is fine, but maybe a few things to liven it up a bit and make it look a little more modern would be nice. The walls are rather blah, so I think some paintings or posters or something would give it more character. At any rate, I liked the fact that Charlotte and I had our own space to work in, even though at times it was a tad cold.

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