Two weeks out of the summer, my boss decided to take a vacation with his family and time off from work. So, I thought to myself: what better time to start my internship search than now? I used the resource links provided by the COMD Communication Design Internship Coordination Site to start my search. I clicked on every website link to see what each job search site offered and then decided which would work best for me. For example, living in the Bronx and living so close to Manhattan, I knew that BE.IN Brooklyn wouldn’t work out for me since my commute time to lots of parts in Brooklyn would be too long, regardless of whether I would be commuting from school, work or home.
The main internships I looked for were labeled “Graphic Design Intern.” I applied to both unpaid and paid internships. One issue I came across during my search, however, were posting for only summer internship positions, which was something I didn’t feel the need to apply for at the time.
A few days later, I heard back from two companies, one of which was Sacatelle. Each interview was conducted in person and on a weekday in the middle of the afternoon. I chose to dress business casual for each interview considering that, from my experience, most companies within a creative field are a little more lax with their dress code. However, I still wanted to make sure that I presented myself in a professional manner.
To each interview, I brought along a digital portfolio that I had saved onto my iPad. I made the choice of having a digital display of my works since each of my works vary in size when it comes to printing and thought it would be easier to not only carry around on my commute to each place, but it also gave the interviewer the chance to see my pieces in their best quality and the ability to zoom in and have closer looks if they desired.
One constant question asked was: Tell me about yourself (which is never a question I like to answer since I can never really gauge if they just want to hear about my personality or my school/work accomplishments). Another question I was asked was: Why would you like to work as a graphic design intern? In addition, whenever the interviewer looked over my portfolio pieces, I made sure to inform them of the ideation and process of each pieces and the purpose of each one.
After the interviews were done, it took days for me to hear anything back. During this time, a third person found my design resume on one of the internship sites and decided to schedule an interview with me. I met with this person and was informed about their company as well as shared information about myself and what I thought I could bring to their company if chosen as a graphic design intern. At the end of this interview, I was offered a position, however, I did not immediately take it. Although it would have worked great within my school/work schedule, I wasn’t so sure if it was the type of work I wanted to be doing, even if it only was a temporary internship.
About a week later, I heard back from Sacatelle, offering me a graphic design internship position. Not being a hasty person, I took some time to consider my options and decide which internship opportunity would be right for me. Ultimately, I decided upon Sacatelle because I felt that I could potentially have more creative design opportunities working for them versus the third company I met with, and so far, I think this has proven to be true.
