The Ultimate Internship: How to

After Anastasia revealed how she made the most of her ultimate internship in last week’s post, we heard from more than a few FLiPs.  "Fabulous to know how to take advantage of an internship", they said, "but what of the kids who need to find one first?!"  A few of the best strategies, FLiP-tested and editor-approved:

The Usual Suspects
If you want to generate a long list of options, the best place to start is with the big search engines, e.g.:

• monstertrak.com
• internshipprograms.com
• wetfeet.internshipprograms.com
• philanthropy.com/jobs/ (Philanthropy-specific)
• idealist.org (nonprofit-specific (more or less))

Each of these has its own set of unique benefits, from allowing you to post your resume to auto-emailing you when opportunities that fit your bill are posted.

College Connections
Whatever stage of the educational game you’re at – undergrad, recent grad, or grad student – your college can be a great resource:

• Schedule a sit-down with your career services counselor
• Search the career services search engine
• Talk to your professors
• If fundraising is your interest, talk to the staff in alumnae relations!  They’ll have lots of connections in the field…and they may even have an in-house internship for you
• If you want to go the corporate route, investigate any recent corporate grants made to your school (e.g., for a medical research project.  The project coordinator may be able to hook you up with someone on the corporate grants team).

The Back Alley
Don’t be afraid to be creative.  If you’re at all interested in a skill set-specific internship at a nonprofit, search the related databases.  A personal case in point: 2+ years ago I was looking for an internship that combined my interests in the communications and nonprofit sectors.  I searched communications job and internship sites like mediabistro.com and ed2010.com (which posts its listings in a “whispers”/legit industry gossip format)…and found a communications internship opportunity at Japan Society, the New York nonprofit. 

That gig was my “ultimate internship” – the Communications Intern title soon grew into Communications Assistant…my first post-college job!

How did you land your ultimate internship?  Strategize with your fellow FLiPs by leaving a comment.

Elisabeth Anderson is a Director in the Philanthropy Division of Changing Our World, Inc., helping corporations align their strategic and philanthropic goals. Elisabeth is also the editor of the August/September issue of FLiP: Education in Philanthropy. She can be reached at eanderson@changingourworld.com