BLOGS

Remember the popular joke on the internet, ‘Organizations want freshers with experience’? 

We all laughed at this ‘meme’ at some point, yet there were some that figured their way around it, but how? The answer to that is internships!  

Internships are the best way to gather basic practical knowledge in any field and courage to enter the workforce ahead of everyone else, while still in college. This blog will help you understand how to take up internships and the benefits of it. 

We have seen a radical shift from traditional learning to experiential learning in the past decade. Back in the day, as traditional learning suggested, students went through school, pre university, under-graduation and then post-graduation before they got their first job. Nowadays, on the contrary, learning is focused on empirical knowledge and making students ready for a job – experiential learning. This is the reason why colleges are taking the effort to push their students to part-take in internships or part time jobs. They are also incorporating practical knowledge in their curriculum and bridging the gap between industry and institute. Education is evolving along with the market. Employers want the cream of each batch and that does not necessarily mean the students that score the highest, it also includes students who have invested in their future by taking extra courses and assisting in imperative internships through their summer/winter breaks.  

No matter what field you are in Employers are always on the lookout for freshers who are open to learning but also someone who can adapt swiftly and be of help to the team during their stay.  If you are a beginner, they may ask you to do research, maintain data, assist and help senior staff. But let us shift the focus on how an intern helps an organization to how an intern benefits from an internship: 

• Prepare for your dream job: everyone imagines where they want to work and what position they want to hold in a certain company. To be able to kickstart that journey well before graduation is the apt option for someone who is ambitious about their career and wants to gear up for the future while shadowing and assisting in a company preparing for the big hit.  
• Understand work culture: while in school and college most of our idea about a work space is limited to what we see on the screen or tea time conversations with our parents. Interning at a company will give you an idea of a real-life work culture: managing leaves, mail culture, office hierarchy, adaptable attitude, and more! 
• Test your passion: have you always known what you wanted to do? Or are you someone who recently had a passion for something and want to pursue it? It is beneficial to know what you want from your job and what job you want but since you are still in college you may not know the entirety of the job to know for certain that this is exactly what you want at least for the next couple of years! For example, you may have wanted to be a pilot since you were a kid and land yourself an internship at the airport in the management department while doing your under graduation. The internship gives you an insight on the tiring/sleepless nights, long flights and uncertain hours of pilots which may make you feel that having a desk job may not hurt, after all. Internships help you test your passion and if you feel that this may not be the place for you, you can always leave in 2/3 months with a certificate and an experience to cherish. 
• Domain Knowledge: simply put, your work changes as your industry does. One may be a content creator but their content will change based on the target audience, market and more. Changing domains gives you an idea about how different industry’s function. An Operation Management intern’s tasks may differ slightly from a Bike Rentals to an e-commerce industry. But to have an idea of how both the industries’ function is important and can help in future, if you want to switch jobs or present a skilled resume to your future employer. 
• Explore your career: it is always considered smart to explore the horizon provided to you by your choice of course. A mass communication student studies photography, content writing, digital marketing, film making and more. She/he may be interested in writing and photography. Taking up two internships during their 3-year course where they get a bird’s eye view of both professions, this will help them choose what jobs to apply for after graduation and what profession they lean towards more. He/she may choose to be a content writer and assist their company in photography too. Having multiple skills and a knowledge/experience in other fields is taken into consideration by employers while hiring.  

• Networking: It is a known fact that gliding through jobs and building contacts are important irrespective of which field you belong to. Talking to the right people at the right time is crucial. It helps in knowing about running job opportunities, exchanging insights, sharing expertise and more. While interning one gets to talk to senior officials. Building good connections with them may help you get a permanent job at the organization, more contacts or leads to better opportunities and strong and apt feedback about yourself. All of these things can make or break your career.  
• Build Resume: bringing us back to what we started with, ‘Organizations want freshers with experience’, you may walk into an internship interview with no work experience and have to do a few assignments before they choose you as an intern. But when you walk out of their door, you carry an added bullet point on your resume which makes you credible and trusted. Building your resume is crucial and it has to start at some point. When your employer, after graduation, takes a look at your resume he should believe that you have some experience in said field or at least know how the professional sphere functions.  
• Professional feedback: at the end of an internship one gets detailed feedback, in letter and orally, from the employer. This will help you understand what you can work on, your strengths and how you performed through the duration of your stay. Validation and criticism will help you better your performance and bring in more authenticity to your work. This essentially prepares you for your future.  
• Learn from others: most institutions, before asking you to do internships, take you through what to except while at one. You may be told and warned that you may have to do a lot of work or none at all. And days when you are asked to do nothing, you can politely ask your office seniors to be shadowed by you. Shadowing is nothing but watching what they do without any indulgence or interference. While you intern at a media house as a photographer you can ask the editor if you can watch what he does and how he does it on your free time. This makes them feel like you are diligent and you also get to pick up on new things. Win-win for you and them. On the other hand, you can also interact and observe employees that you idealize and would want to be like.  
• Job contract: getting a PPO is not that a bad deal, if your internship organization likes your work and feels that you could be a good permanent candidate, they may even offer you a Permanent Placement Offer (PPO) that asks you to join them right after graduation. This way you know for sure you have one opportunity available at your fingertips before college even ends! 

Now for a question we are sure many of you have; Should you take up Unpaid Internships?  

We agree that having to work with a company for 2-3 months as an intern without pay must be frustrating, it benefits them and many people will advise you against it. But let’s not forgot that you will get to learn and unlearn at your first internship and most importantly, come out of it as a trustworthy and stipend-deserving student! So, if your situations do not force you to, do not shy away from an unpaid internship. These are your stepping stones and years of investment to build your professional future/network. 

Does that make you feel time constraint and confused? Well, it is never too late you can still catch up and get yourself an internship that helps your career. It may feel like ‘adulting’ and you may be put off by it or procrastinating too much, but all you really have to do is create a CV/Resume.  Fill in your CV with necessary details like: 

• Your name 
• Name of your 10th & 12th institutions with final aggregates  

• Current educational institute along with the semester 
• Soft Skills 
• Hobbies and interests 
• Extra and co-curricular achievements 
• Courses taken apart from your regular education 

• Work experience if you’ve had any 

Finally add a declaration and you’re set! Do not forget a cover letter, there are many samples for reference that you can find on the internet! A cover letter gives a more casual insight to your employer about you. Your cover letter must contain your intentions on the internship provided by them, your skills, an adequate amount of excitement to join their organization and how you fit the role. Now all that is left is to go onto job portals and send in your resume to companies hiring interns in different domains! 

Top management colleges in Bangalore like those managed by New Horizon Institutions prepare their students for the outside world and make them industry-ready. Our curriculums of the best management courses in India are deeply derived from major industry changes. The impact of the industry is recognized and inculcated in our syllabus and day to day learning. Students are trained by the placement cell to be prepared for the professional sphere, while industry leaders are brought in for special seminars, workshops and lectures. Students are also encouraged to take up internships through the semester breaks.  Only the top 10 best management colleges in Bangalore among the list of best management colleges in Bangalore take the effort to make students industry-ready and steer them in the direction of a bright future, just like any top colleges in Bangalore and top colleges in India should do. 

Now that you know that NHCM – New Horizon College Marathahalli is one of the best management schools in India, why step back and click out of this article? Head straight to our admissions page and fill in that form to your dream college with an array of courses tailor-made to help you succeed. Hurry Admissions are Open!