Tuesday, September 1, 2015

When In Corporate America And Internship Advice Is Given To You

It's the first of the month. Everyone who lives in a luxurious (or not so luxurious) apartment is getting their rent paid. They are also counting the money that's left to make sure other bills that are due around this time also get taken care of. With money being put toward bills, on the day before a group of business people would have a conversation about what we should be doing when sending out job applications.

It started when I decided to peek into twitter to be nosy. Twitter is where important news and ignorance meets. There was plenty of ignorance going on, but this certain business hashtag caught my attention. It was #internpro. I clicked on the hashtag to see what was going on. The conversation between these people was all about what anyone applying for jobs should be doing. All of the advice was something we've all heard before. There was there traditional resume, the linkedin profile, the (non-existent) squeaky clean social media accounts, a brand representing the person applying, lots and lots of experience, and following up after initially applying for the job.

When you really think about all the advice it seems as if you might as well be making money already if you have all that going on. However, not everyone does. Not everyone has work to add to a resume. Not everyone has a squeaky clean social media account and if they do you should be cautious around them. Not everyone knows how to brand themselves, but they do have that dream job in mind. They are choosing those certain places to apply to on purpose and they've received so many rejection letters that their spirits are being drained. Their bank accounts are also empty.

For some of this twitter chat I just retweeted and read what they were saying. Then I decided to reply to something one of the men said. My question was what if people are just graduating college or have nothing to put on their resumes. He responded by talking about internships. Internships are all peaches and cream, but most of them don't help pay the bills.

My rent alone is $710. The electricity (air conditioner and utilities)  bill can be anywhere between $50 and $120 depending on the time of year. I'm still trying to pay off all the furniture in my apartment. I have a few credit cards. I currently keep my hair short and rarely let a beautician do anything special to it. I don't get manicures or pedicures and rarely take trips out of the city already. I'm a grown woman who is already trying to be financially responsible. Now after years out of college the best answer that someone who has been in the working world forever and calls themselves an expert can give is an internship.

I wasn't asking the question for myself. I figured maybe some new college grads were reading. Some people who had been unemployed could have been paying attention and they needed to hear something refreshing. They didn't need to get the same recycled advice. Sallie Mae employees gives these people around nine months after graduating before they start looking for money. Parents don't want their grown children living in their house. If they do, then they don't see those children as grown yet. These unemployed people are also applying to jobs that are supposedly hiring. If the jobs are hiring, then they are even more confused as to why they are not getting the open positions.

Now the guy's internship advice wasn't totally bad. The problem with the internship advice is there was a movie starring Will Smith called The Pursuit of Happyness. The movie was all about single father that ended up homeless. During his time of living on the streets with his son he was doing this internship that could lead to an excellent business career. That movie is fiction.

No comments :

Post a Comment

Lashuntrice

Lashuntrice