What Can I Expect As an IT Intern? 325
p3np8p3r writes "I'm in college and working towards my Bachelors in Computer Science. Last year I passed both my CompTIA A+ and Network+ certifications and now have been offered (via a staffing company) a full-time Internship at a wireless lab of a major laptop manufacturer. The pay is going to be around $8 an hour full-time but that is not my primary motivator. I'm considering this significant decrease in pay from my previous (non-IT) job to be counterbalanced by what valuable knowledge I may gain both in the technical aspects and industry insight while I finish school. This field is all new to me and I don't personally know anyone who has worked in it before who will give me their honest opinions on it. Although I know circumstances differ greatly, in general, what can I expect as an IT Intern? What have been your experiences?"
Read Dilbert (Score:4, Funny)
read Dilbert [dilbert.com] to get more insight into the Industry then you ever wanted.
Also you may want do have a look at Userfriendly [userfriendly.org], Hackles [hackles.org] and early Reallifecomics [reallifecomics.com].
Maybe all this wisdom can help you picture, where you are going.
For your Internship, be ready to be the *** of the Company.
Do not stop looking for more internship opportunities.
When systems go down... (Score:5, Funny)
...and you're tied to that post in the middle of the office with everyone baying for blood about their lack of access to youtube or joke emails and you're about to receive the cat 'o nine tails, make sure you take up the offer of hard leather or wood to bite down on.
Re:I was hired where I interned (Score:3, Funny)
First thing in the morning make sure everyone et a cup before asking.
It might help to be there a little early.
Get a little rolling bolster, so delivering coffee will be easier.
It might be funny for your co-workers, if you get a little starbucks cap.
You can expect... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:I was hired where I interned (Score:5, Funny)
IMO Its better for your career (in the long run) and sanity to work in some hypothetical burger joint on $6/hr for a GOOD boss than somewhere on $60,000 for an asshole who won't let you get any useful experience under your belt or otherwise let you progress.
If the latter is per year. If it's per hour you can paint me in lipstick and call me Sue if that makes you happy.
Well... (Score:3, Funny)
Day 1 you'll likely have to spend several hours scrubbing an executive's PDA to ensure that his wife doesn't find out he's banging two fo the gals in accounting and marketing. He'll then berate you on how slow and useless you are.
Day 2 you'll likely spend 4 hours in a vendor meeting listening to your boss and the sales rep talk about where they want to go golfing and setting up a "tech demo" in that city. He'll promptly buy whatever nonsense the sales rep is hawking with a wink and a "Happy Ending" to the deal.
Day 3 you'll sit in a meeting with senior management bitching about costs and how worthless the IT\MIS department is and how they need to outsource to cut costs.
Day 4 You'll either start drinking or smoking to cope with the sheer amount of bullshit.
Day 5 if your smart you quit, if you are an idiot you'll spend 10 years doing IT work then finally quit.
Day 6 You've joined the dumb-ass catagory and decided to stick with it. You'll be asked to set up a Squid proxy solution so a smarmy ass-hat of a manager can try and find reasons to fire the three people that actually work so her neice can get one of the three now vacant jobs. You'll spend hours pouring through log files after hours trying to find a single inapporpriate web site so they can fire some people.
Day 7 You'll notice there isn't a mention of a weekend. That is because you will be stuck in a telco-closet tone testing wires and labeling thousands of connections because the wiring contractors never labeled anything because it is one of the executives cousins business that got the job so at Christmas Mr. Exec get 1/2 the profits from the job in his stocking...
Only an idiot or someone into S&M gets into IT anymore. Go work at Burger King, the co-workers are nicer, the manager are at least honest when it comes to treating you like cattle, and there is better career advancement.
Otherwise get ready to be treated like a fucking pesant, at least that's the general feel here in MN.