Being a young adult and student comes with a certain level of uncertainty for many. By having chosen a Bachelor’s program, we have roughly started carving our career path but a broad study such as Communication Science offers plenty of room for specialization.
An internship is thus an ideal opportunity for us students to filter out more precisely what we are interested in and what we are not.
I got to find out a bit more about my interests during my internship at W.Green, an intersectional brand agency for impact-driven brand identity, innovation and editorial communication. With clients such as Soho House, Pukka or FREITAG, W.Green is well-established as a branding and communication agency in Amsterdam which I was excited to become a (temporary) part of.
As a project management intern, I created monthly press clippings reports for the clients, assisted in events, prepared giftings and helped with administrative tasks.
Starting my internship, I came to experience some disappointment. The internship did not fully meet my expectations and I got disappointed that I did not see myself doing this for the rest of my working life. Subconsciously, I had probably hoped or expected to come out of this internship having figured out which profession I want to pursue and which field of the job market fits me best. Probably unsurprisingly, I did not have this realization and as a consequence, I doubted that I will ever find my spot in the industry.
If I don’t like this job field, then shouldn’t this show me what I want to do instead? Everyone else seems to know better where they want to go with their degree.
Despite knowing that these thoughts were not fully rational, I did feel possibly more lost during my internship than before, as if I am in a labyrinth taking turns without knowing where I will end up.
In retrospective, I nonetheless see my internship experience in a positive light as I have realized a couple of things.
Even though the field I got to know during my internship ended up not being a fit for me, I learned a lot from the practical experiences during my internship, both on a professional and a personal level. Internships are basically a trial and error process but even those that do not meet one’s expectations help to get to the next step on the winding career path.
And based on my colleagues’ experiences, I realize that even if you are already fully immersed in the working world, you might still never be fully settled. New opportunities arise that bring along new uncertainties and thus, the winding path doesn’t necessarily stop. For some, the job-related exploration continues for longer than for others and for those who always seek challenges and thrive on new experiences, it could even continue for all their working life.
As a student, there is undoubtedly comfort in knowing precisely what career path you aspire after your studies, where you want to work and what you want to achieve. But some, like me, have not figured this out yet and this is something I, more and more, view as something that should be embraced.
There is no denying that saying this comes from a position of privilege – that of being able to freely choose a career, to explore different opportunities that appear. But being aware of this privilege helps to see it as a responsibility to make the most of the opportunities we are given.
The uncertainty of where I will end up one day gives me the freedom and the motivation to discover different fields and occupations. It essentially pushes you to pursue all opportunities presented to you on the professional and personal journey, meanwhile discovering new interest and staying openminded towards the unknown.
Some might have a direct hit with their first internship but many probably don’t. And that is perfectly fine because every experience lets you gather valuable insights that, in some way or another, will shape what is to come.