I am going to assume the primary reader of this post will be in the process of trying to land their first or maybe second internship (LIA) somewhere, it’s not easy, trust me I know. Hopefully I will help you find some solace that you are not alone in the struggle. Hopefully reading about my experiences can help you keep your head up. After all, all it takes is one single yes…

My name is Laura, and I am a second-year customer experience specialist student from IHM Business School in Stockholm. I am currently about to start my second internship at Symplify. In the upcoming blog posts, I will write about my experiences before and during my internship, about challenges, new insights and whatever thoughts I might have throughout.

And I´m not going to sugar coat it, the struggle is real (!). Internships are often highly sought after; it challenges you and gives you the opportunity to put your new knowledge and skills to the test in a real world work environment. It might even be your first real job. But getting one, that is where the real challenge lies. I came into the struggle without any connections within the industry, and since the CX programme is new at IHM, the school did not have much experience in providing internships to the CX students.

LinkedIn is a great place, but even then the going can be tough. I added A LOT of people on LinkedIn, wrote them a nice message, attached my newly designed resume and eagerly waited for a positive response that they wanted to offer me an internship. Radio silence. Left “on read”. Ghosted. That is the response I got probably 9 out of 10 times. But LinkedIn, that is what most people recommend you do, network, network and network. It was not working though. I needed a complementary strategy to my LinkedIn stalking and messaging.

Job postings. In a lot of job postings (but far from all of them), the company offers a person of contact with an e-mail address. That is the person I reached out to. I used whatever site where they had job postings and started head hunting email addresses. I must say that this strategy raised my response rate significantly. I would recommend it over LinkedIn. At the end of the day, what really helped reach an internship was asking for help. The course coordinator at school helped me come in contact with Gustav at Symplify, the one that said yes.

Two calls, two referrals and two weeks later, I got it. I got an internship and a thousand pounds of weight lifted off my shoulders.

Tuesday 5th of March at 9.15 at the Symplify office, Drottninggatan 55, I had my first meeting with Merete, director of customer success and my mentor for my upcoming internship. With a warm smile she greeted me at the door to their New York style office with high ceilings and brick walls.

It made me really happy and appreciative towards Symplify when Merete told me how much they value interns. Interns have been an asset to Symplify, they have helped the company grow, therefore it is of importance to give back and offer students internship opportunities. I advise all companies to take after Symplify.

I left the first meeting with a positive feeling.

• Dare to ask your school for help, it is also their responsibility to help you connect with possible internships.
• As mentioned, check current job postings. Even if the posting is not directly related to your area of interest, if it contains a person of contact, send them an email anyway. It might lead your way to your yes-man.