Rotman To The Core: Five Ways To Approach Your MBA Internship

“It feels like the first day of school.”

That’s what I told my husband as I stuffed my backpack for the first day of my summer internship.

“I’m nervous,” I added.

It was 6:30 in the morning. The kids were racing around while my husband and I tried to wrangle them and get them to their daycare by 7 a.m.

After all, I didn’t want to be late on the very first day of my internship.

I had many reasons to be excited. I was going to work as a strategic business analyst at a regional hospital, where I would get first-hand experience with the Canadian healthcare system. I would be focusing on community engagement and patient experience, which tied both into my background and where I wanted to take my career.

Many business schools require an internship, or co-op, as part of their MBA programs. At the Rotman School of Management, where I go to business school, it’s part of a class called “Applied Management Placement,” and there are strict requirements about what qualifies as an internship and what does not. We also submit reflections about our work and get feedback from our managers, as well as meet with an internship adviser three times for advice and feedback on our progress.

Beyond that, though, there are seemingly limitless internships and opportunities to put what we learn into practice. This gives us a lot of free rein to use our internships to help set ourselves up for success in our careers.

I honestly didn’t know what to expect from mine. As a seasoned professional with over thirteen years of experience across marketing and communications, it felt weird to go back as an “intern” when the last time I’d been an intern was in 2010. That being said, I wanted to do everything I could to make a good impression in my role and maximize my learning. Like many of my fellow Rotman students, I had my own plans about what this internship meant to me.

And that looked very different from what others planned.

FIVE WAYS TO APPROACH YOUR MBA INTERNSHIP

There are many ways that I’ve seen fellow students approach their internships, each trying to get the most out of it in their own ways. These ways are not mutually exclusive: one student could be approaching their internship in all five ways or another student could just be laser-focused on one. There are no right or wrongs ways – like getting an MBA, we all had our different goals that we wanted to get out of our internship. It’s best to be aware of these different reasons, know what they mean for you, and take the opportunity by the horns.

As this is the season for students to apply, interview, and accept internships for the summer, I wanted to highlight five of these ways to approach your MBA internship, so you know exactly what you’re looking for.

1. Use it as a learning opportunity: For many MBA students, the internship is your first real-world opportunity to put what you’ve learned in class into practice. At the same time, you’ll take your learnings from your internship with you into your next classes or role. After all, at Rotman, the internship is a class in and of itself – this is learning on-the-job for one reason or another.

This approach is the main one where I’m focused. I worked as a strategic business analyst (which will admittedly sound cool on my resume) for a regional hospital. Through this role, I went into my internship wanting to be exposed to the challenges and opportunities that are available in the healthcare sector in Canada. Being an American – and only working in healthcare adjacent roles, like health insurance or hospital advertising – this gave me a crash course in the Canadian healthcare system in a way that I can’t get in a classroom. I recognized that It may or may not convert to full-time, but that wasn’t my main focus: I used this time to complement my experience and my education.

2. Land a full-time role: Many internships, especially those in consulting and finance, convert to full-time during the summer. In fact, I believe that the class before ours had 25% of the internships convert to full-time offers even before classes resume in September, with many more converting in the winter and spring terms.

he classic example are those students who converted their roles before the last day of their internship. But I’ve had more friends who kept in touch with their managers and heard back months later that a role opened up for them. Such was the case for my friend Shimin, who accepted a role in October – a couple months after her internship ended at a bank (congratulations again, Shimin!). Some even get asked to continue their internship on a part-time basis until they graduate. Students know this when applying for internships, and it’s a huge relief to go into your second year knowing that you’re set for a job upon graduation. The main thing is to not despair if your internship doesn’t convert right away. It may convert further down the line, or something else will come along.

3. Try a new career: Some MBA students are trying to pivot out of their former careers and into new ones. Having an internship gives students an opportunity to see if a new industry or role is something where they want to build a long-term career – almost like a trial period. For the employer, it’s pretty low risk to bring a student from a different background into their workplace and see how they do. Maybe it’s a perfect fit, or maybe the student wants to go in a different direction. Regardless, it’s a good way to see if you like the career before fully committing to a full-time role.

My friend Jovan took this approach. He successfully pivoted from being a brilliant music composer to a private equity associate with his internship. Ultimately, he decided to continue in finance after graduation as result. It’s an example of how going in another direction can be the right direction all along.

4. Do it for fun: This is a little different than the one above, as I know some students who have taken some internships outside of their wheelhouses because they just want to try something new. What I find even cooler is that their MBA classes gave them the skills to do a seemingly 180-degree turn to try something completely different – for fun.

For example, I have a friend who works in medicine and wants to stay there after graduation. However, she took an internship in private equity because she was curious to try it out. In her role, she was exposed to marketing firms and cybersecurity – all things she would never have a chance to try out in her day-to-day role. And, as an added bonus, she says that she can bang a presentation deck out quickly now.

5. Earn some money: This one is kind of obvious. The truth of the matter is, business school can expensive, and every little bit helps pay tuition and rent, or just pick up something extra from the grocery store. By the time internship season rolls around, many students are looking for some financial relief as many were too busy with a full-time class load to work. As a requirement for Rotman, all internships must be paid, so this is a chance to get some extra cash in your pocket, especially as the second-year rolls around.

Without going into too much detail, getting this extra money was a boon to my family over the summer because we suddenly found ourselves needing the paycheck from my internship. Because of that, I’m immensely grateful for the internship, the requirement, and what I learned.

Regardless of your approach, internships are a unique opportunity to explore, learn, and grow. Embrace the experience, make meaningful connections, and most importantly, enjoy the journey. You have twelve or so weeks to make a difference and an impression with your internship – don’t waste a single second.

IN CONCLUSION, A (HAPPY) UPDATE TO MY APPROACH AND INTERNSHIP

I started writing this article in the summer, and quickly got buried under work, class, and kids. As a result, there has been a few updates to my internship, approach, and my career moving forward.

First of all, I went into my internship focusing on it being a learning opportunity. I got to sit in Senior Leadership meetings, run a press conference, and help with a merger with two hospitals – all things I’ve never had a chance to do before. I would not have had this chance had I not taken the internship.

What’s more, I found that the money really helped when I needed it. And, I’m happy to say, even though my internship ended at the beginning of September, I got a call back a couple of months later asking if I could re-join on a part-time basis, shifting to a full-time contract after graduation.

Of course, I happily accepted.

Erin Gulyas has been fascinated with stories ever since her Barbie dated her Swamp Thing action figure when she was three years old. Since then, she has turned this passion into telling stories for brands and companies to better connect with consumers. She comes to the Rotman School of Management at The University of Toronto with 13 years of experience in advertising and marketing. After graduating with a Bachelor Degree of Science from the University of Texas at Austin in 2009, Erin completed a Graduate Diploma in Advertising Creativity from the Auckland University of Technology.

She has worked as a copywriter at lead advertising agencies and companies in both New Zealand and America. She last worked for Blue Shield of California as the Senior Manager of Content and Communications, where she oversaw six writers and three digital media specialists to create 4000+ member-facing communications per year. In her spare time (what little there is), she’s a New York Times bestselling author when she’s not wrangling her two young children.

You can find her on LinkedIn, and if you like Star Wars, we’re already best friends.

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