*Disclaimer: I am literally just graduating college and figuring my own sh*t but I think I know something?
Let’s throwback to 2013- I was a know-it-all 18-year-old entering college who knew that by 2020 I was going to be one of the newest (and best) lawyers New York had to offer. NEWSFLASH things change and that’s what college is about. By my sophomore year I found myself immersed in Public Relations, something I didn’t even know existed until an introduction to mass communications class.
I kept hearing you need to get an internship for the experience from every.single.professor. But I wanted to make money at my home job and have the summer with my friends, I had all of college to figure out how to get a job after college right? Wrong. Looking back, I am so happy I started interning my second semester of sophomore year. Now, I’m a senior in my fourth internship and I’m completely confident in what I want to do when I “grow up.”
In PR there’s so many different areas you can get into, but just like food you don’t know what you like until you try it. I’ve completed internships at a non-profit agency, a medical device company, beauty and wellness PR Agency, and a healthcare, financial, tech, energy and consumer PR Agency.
These experiences helped me figure out three key things:
I like working in an agency.
I don’t want to do purely social media.
I hate hate HATE working on energy clients.
This matters because now that I am looking for a job I can look at these things I didn’t like and not apply to places or positions that offer this type of work. Interning is KEY to figuring out what you want to do and side-note there are TONS of paid opportunities. Out of my four internships only one wasn’t paid but the experience, team, and not to mention the free stuff I got made it all worth it.
My advice in one sentence: INTERN AS MUCH AS YOU CAN.
Now where do I suggest finding these internships I talk about?
Indeed.com
Looksharp.com
Linkedin (I find this a little more difficult though)
Your College/University's career portal
Also – something that I do – look up companies I want to work at, go to their careers section and bam there’s an internship listing. Don’t be scared to reach out to an HR manager either their job is to find people that fits a position!
Best of luck. Xo.
Lu
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