I hope everyone is learning a lot in your internship. Here is question #2. Please comment on this and feel free to respond to other’s comments as well.
What are some of the important things that you had to find out on your own–having to do with the company culture and/or things you wouldn’t normally think you have to ask for…finding the bathroom, finding where to get coffee in the morning, etc?
Good morning,
I am learning a lot! The company culture is not what I would have expected. There are high expectations with the assumption you know the expectations. You also have to learn where to park, not every free spot is a good one. I also had to structure incidents or tickets into a priority queue, based on the severity of the incident, and had to figure out how to do that based on trial and error.
Then there’s the social aspect, especially in meetings with managers, where you have to learn how to take ownership and accountability, without completely throwing yourself under the bus for mistakes made, so you make sure to document responsibilities, follow up meetings with an email recap of expected deliverable, deadlines, needs for the project, etc. These are from of those expectations that are, in a way, expected and not expressed.
Hi everyone!
One of the biggest things I had to learn on my own was how communication actually works at the company. Email communication was much more casual and straightforward than I expected. I also learned that some coworkers prefer other methods of communications over email, which wasn’t immediately obvious. Similarly, feedback was more direct and less sugar-coated than I anticipated, which took some time to adjustment to at first, but ended up being very helpful.
Another surprise was the dress code. The employee handbook stated business professional, but on my first day almost no one was dressed that way, most were wearing hoodies or sweaters. I definitely stood out at first, which was pretty funny in hindsight and taught me quickly that the “written” culture doesn’t always equals the reality.
Hi–
I have learned a lot during my internship, but there are a couple of things I found surprising:
Video etiquette: at the start of my internship, I thought I had to have my camera on and dress professionally for every meeting, even though I work remotely, but I was completely wrong. It is more common not have your camera on and totally acceptable to attend meetings in an Eagles hoodie.
Communication: I had to very quickly learn that different people prefer different methods and tones of communication. Some prefer emails, some a quick team message, some prefer to make small talk at the start of a meeting, and some like to get straight to the point. I have realized that to be successful in my role, I need to adapt and communicate in ways that are preferred by each person on the team.
Lastly, finding who knows what: the org chart might show structure, but it does not show who the real go-to people are. I have found that joining meetings a couple of minutes early to get to chat with team members about their work or sitting in meetings are not particularly related to my tasks to observe, helps me build mental notes on who to reach out to when needing assistance for my project, not to mention it allows me to network as well.