A lesson from my internship that I plan to transfer to my school life

One skill I am learning a lot from my internship is the importance of forming connections with fellow interns and employees beyond work. This is my first in-person internship and the company’s first in-person summer internship since the outbreak of COVID-19. There are so many social activities organized for interns in different organizations within Microsoft to meet and network with each other. I am part of a cohort of over twelve interns in various teams who meet weekly to play games, solve puzzles, go on kayaking trips, and do other fun activities. Having such fun activities embedded into my internship experience is helping me take breaks between work to get re-energized alongside meeting students from different schools. Additionally, organized social activities are forcing me to push beyond my introverted self to connect with people more.

An event I enjoyed at the start of my internship was a team building event where my organization took all interns and full-time employees for a ziplining trip. It was a great opportunity to meet employees on different teams in my organization, especially those who work fully remote. We worked through different ziplining activities that helped us learn about effective communication and teamwork in practical ways. Having such activities where I interact with my manager, mentor, and other full-time employees in a less formal setting allowed me to learn more about their life experiences like family and travel experiences. These interactions also helped me identify employees who share similar interests with me like hiking.

Moving beyond my internship, I plan to incorporate more social activities into my school experience at Berea. After two years of socially-distance learning, I have found it hard to connect with students outside my majors. So, I plan to attend more college events to network with students, professors, and other people outside Computer Science and Mathematics. I hope to utilize such social activities as a means to destress in school, like I am using them in my internship.