How to Make the Most of a Summer Internship: Preparing For Your First Day

This article is sponsored by Goldman Sachs.

Summer internships are a great way for college students to develop business skills and to learn about professional life. As former Goldman Sachs interns and now full-time employees, Serrena and Jeremy know all about what it takes to make the most of a summer internship. A 2012 Yale graduate, Serrena majored in applied math and had four internships (three of them at Goldman Sachs!) before landing a full-time job with the company. She currently works in equity trading in the Securities division. A former economics major who graduated from the University of Michigan, Jeremy interned at Goldman Sachs the summer after his junior year. He currently holds a position in Operations.

In the first part of this three-part series, Serrena and Jeremy offer advice on how to prepare for the first day of your internship.

What’s the best advice you have on preparing for day one of the internship program?

Jeremy: Something I did which I found very helpful was a dry run of my commute the day before I started my internship. I woke up early, put on my suit, and ran through all the subways and the PATH train to make sure that I could arrive at my job on time just in case there were any mishaps with transportation on my first day.

Serrena: I would completely agree. That first day when you’re super stressed out, the devil is in the details. The day before just pick out your favorite outfit, map the way there, set one or two (or in my case, five or seven alarms) so you get there on time.

What did you do to feel prepared for the internship?

Jeremy: I would say it’s important to brush up on as much technical knowledge as possible in your field. It’s important to read the headlines and know what’s going on in the industry, and it’s also important to learn as much as possible about the job so you can really hit the ground running.

Serrena: I agree. Read about the stories that are affecting your industry and affecting your firm in particular, but also remember that when you get there, no one’s expecting you to sit down and do their jobs immediately, especially in sales and trading. What I would say is, just know what makes someone good in that role and how to focus on getting there. For example, a trader should be into the markets, able to think quickly on their feet, and quantitative. Once you know the goals you’re focusing on, you can really make the internship work for you.     

Knowing what you know now, what additionally would you have done to prepare? What would you have changed?

Jeremy: This sort of goes against my first point, but I think I probably spent a little too much time focusing on the technical aspects, and given that it was my first real job and real professional experience, I didn’t focus enough time on soft skills. I wish I would have leveraged some of the contacts in my network to learn some of the soft skills that would help me on day one.

Serrena: You’re going to have spent a ton of time reading up and absorbing knowledge and memorizing a ton of different facts, but I think what’s important to do is also think about forming your own opinions and your questions about those facts because when you come for the summer, people aren’t going to expect you to just put your head down and grind it out, they’re going to want to see that you’ve been forming thoughts and opinions on what you’re learning and that you’ve come in with a lot of questions to learn about their day-to-day job.

To learn more about current Goldman Sachs internship opportunities, explore the full list of positions on WayUp.