How to ensure we don't waste our time during an internship/student job?
How to surely waste our time during an internship/student job? Not seizing the opportunity given to us.
What is the purpose of these jobs? A foot in the door. To learn the field in practice, not just in theory. To get to know the people and processes that truly make it happen. To gain experience for a full-time position.
So how can you avoid doing this?
Here's a list that can help with wasting our time:
- Only operate within our job description. Why would we do more?
- Don't connect with anyone outside our role/field. They're not relevant, right?
- Don't connect with managers and senior staff. What do we have to do with them?
- Don't share insights to advance the team/organization. That's job security as a knowledge source, isn't it?
- Don't document our work and successes. Managers will already know how to promote us, right?
- Show up at the office the bare minimum required. If our tasks are done, what does it matter?
- Don't publicize my work in the role. That's what a line on a resume is for, right?
- Don't attend tech and social events. A waste of time, no?
Folks, our ecosystem is technology-based, but it's made up of people. For now, at least, until AI agents run everything here. But rumors say there's still time until then.
By the way, if you want to make the most of these opportunities... Doing the opposite of this list could be a good start.
How do you seize opportunities? Share in the comments. (And if not, I'd appreciate it if you commented on how you like your coffee to increase the chance of this being exposed to someone who needs this post 🫶🏻 Ron Kavunovski)
By the way, the picture is from the last event of "Not Technical and Not by Chance", a live recording of Adir Kandel's and Tal Moskovich's podcast. Yours truly also appears in the recording for a minute and a half. There's another event on 8/7 about what it means to be a code person in 2026?! I'll be there, last spots remaining, registration link in the comments. (Who do you recognize in the picture? Quite a few stars there)
Originally posted on LinkedIn — join the discussion and share your thoughts in the comments.