Tips for finding your first internship
Tags: career, productivity
Published: 2020-03-08 17:28:52

I have been in the software industry for almost a year now, and when I was first searching for jobs, I was overwhelmed and wished that someone who was relatable to me would share their tips and tricks for getting the first role.

I think it's important that you understand my background at the time, so that you can see what I had to work with. 

I was: 

* Working 2 jobs, both retail

* A junior in college, working on a CS degree

* A good student

* Not creative... didn't have much to put on a portfolio

* Good at web development

I needed a job which was part-time and would bring me into the industry. I thought that would be impossible to find, but I was surprised at how many there were. Here are my tips for finding your internship.

# Get help with your resume 

Before I visited the career center at my school, I was convinced that my resume was fantastic. I googled for hours trying to find tips and tricks for making it better. For this reason, I didn't think it was necessary to meet a career counselor about it. Luckily, the school required that all students using its system to apply for jobs have a few appointments with a career counselor first.

As it turns out, my resume was NOT good. The career counselor very nicely tore the thing apart, pointing out its flaws, and helped me to build a resume which was actually good.

Immediately I started getting calls from employers. This was the single biggest boon to my job search at the time. Even if you don't have access to a career counselor, I'd suggest finding someone you trust to take a look at your resume and see if it's any good. Chances are that they'll find a few things that can be improved upon, and you'll have an easier time finding jobs after making some changes.

# Get your name out there

Truthfully, I didn't even apply to my internship. I had no idea that the company existed before receiving an e-mail from them reaching out to see if I'd be interested in working there. They found my resume on a career board, and they desperately needed a part-time developer to help their team out. 

I had a few other offers from companies that I actually applied to, but having your name out there on a few job boards will take a lot of the burden off of your shoulders. Posting blog posts on sites like this one will help in getting your name out there too!

# List some projects on your resume

If you are like I was, you don't have any professional experience that is relevant to the positions that you're interested in. To prove that you're capable, you're going to have to place a "projects" section onto your resume. 

During interviews, my prospective employers were always impressed by the projects that I put in this section. You can put whatever you've built, as long as you are prepared to talk about it at length in your interview. 

To get my internship, I had a note-taking web app, another web app which I ended up not finishing, and my portfolio website on my resume. Under each project title I had a few bullet points which explained how I built the projects, and what they did. In the interview I was asked about why I used the technologies I used, and to go a bit more in-depth about the process and the status of the applications. 


If you follow these tips, I promise that you'll have an easier time finding jobs. Good luck!