You don’t need to know the answer, but you need to know where to find it
At Babson, we are taught to cast our net wide and explore all the opportunities available to us. Getting a summer internship is only the start of this process. Throughout the school year, there is always chatter regarding who is working where, and how they got connected with a company. Well, I am here to tell you… that the hard part doesn’t end when you find your internship.
Throughout my time at Raptor Capital Management, I quickly learned that the hardest part was not the application and networking aspect. Rather, it was being asked to do something, and not knowing in the slightest how to do it, and having to figure it out. I would be lying if I said I knew how to do every task I was given. However, what I did know how to do, was research and ask the right questions.
As we sit in our classrooms, we are taught, tested, and then evaluated on our ability to recall exactly what we were taught. Some of us have been going through this cycle for almost 15 years—when in reality, inside workspace often you are your own teacher and many times you are your own evaluator. If our internship team presents something to our manager, and it is not “correct”, we are told to fix it. We do not just get to put the “assignment” away only because we handed it in.
Work and school, School and Work… Babson is unlike many other schools. We are taught to “figure it out” when we don’t know the answers. The entrepreneurial mindset we acquire is not only meant for those who are starting companies, but it is also for those who want to work in one. When we don’t know the answers, we know how to leverage our resources, investigate, and ultimately find it.
Finding an internship was step one, the hard part, is now. Finding the answers to the questions, and uncovering exactly what it is you do not know… that is when the work begins.