Are Internships a good option for getting a foot in the door?

mxmaniac

I'm A+, and Network+ certified, trying to break into the IT field with minimal IT expericne. (My recent work has all been commercial construction). I'm having a very hard time. I've always heard about "internships", and wondered if its something I should consider.

In particular I'm wondering.
1) I've always been under the impression internships are for college students. Can a job seeker like me who is self studying even get an internship?
2) If so, where do I even look? I've been spending hours every day searching for work, and never came across any internships advertised anywhere. Is there a trick to finding them?
3) How often are they paid vs unpaid?
4) I once heard someone on these forums mention they were able to find a paid internship, which paid even more than what his friend was making who had gotten a regular job. Is that common, or a super rare occurance?
5) How long do they generally last, are they full time or part time?
6) Is it considered bad, or acceptable to leave one if you get a job offer, or need more time to focus on your job search?
I'm in a situation right now with zero income, savings exhausted, and a mortgage. I need a job absolutely ASAP, so I would be worried about if the internship took too much away from my job search abilities, and if a job did come up I'd need to jump on it.

Thanks.

lsud00d

Internships take various forms.

My experience

I had one in college (through my university) that required me to work full-time (40hrs/wk) while I was in school full time. The days were long but it was my foot in the door because as soon as I finished my degree I was given a promotion/raise. But, my internship was salaried @35k w/full benefits...I think that's on the rarer side of internships (decent pay w/full benefits).

My perception

1. I believe so but this blurs the lines between intern and apprentice
2. Try this - Find IT Internships on Internships.com
3. I would never do an unpaid internship. The laws vary by states but in many cases this is illegal.
4. As stated from my experience, I haven't come across many internships that were salaried w/full benefits (except for Google and the like!)
5. Mine was full time but I'm sure it varies.
6. It's never bad to leave one job for a better one, just make sure your exit is graceful and you don't burn any bridges.

Have you posted your resume here? Have you done any labbing at home? What area are you in? There are many factors that can affect your job search, but we're here to help!

Kai123

I think my 6 month internship helped (unpaid, full time, extra contribution via welfare for doing it!). Its completely unrelated to what I'm doing now, but trying to sell customer service from a retail perspective to an employer is alot harder then from a IT helpdesk one.

Going from nothing, anything helps. The problem is weighing up the potential loss of opportunities doing one, although you might be opening more opportunities by doing it, but that gamble is apart of life anyway

Krones

I wanted to work at a specific company but had no IT experience and didn't think I'd get hired in for any IT jobs. I took a position as an intern in the QA department, at 32 years old mind you, and was lucky enough to be promoted six months later to a junior system admin's position.

Rare but it can happen. This is a much smaller shop. A lot of the interns are offered full time jobs once their internship is complete.

Have you tried working with a recruiter?

jofas88

I participated in an internship while I was in college, and it proved to be a pivotal point in launching my career. I worked in a Hospital doing desk side support making minimum wage, $7.45 in my state at the time, and worked about 20hrs a week. I did it for about a year and was eventually offered a full time position @ $40,000 year w/ benefits. I ended up leaving school to take the job, leaving my degree in CS unfinished. I ultimately regret not finishing my degree because after working the helpdesk/desk side support role for about 3 years, I began to realize it wasn't for me. So here I am back in school trying to finish my degree in network administration/security, which is where I feel I want to move with my career. The way I found this internship was not through a posting or advertisement, I actually called any "large" corporation/business that I knew would have an IT department and asked to talk to the CIO or someone in charge. I then asked them directly if they had any internships available. I received a lot of "no" answers, but also received a solid amount of positive responses. Some companies hadn't even thought of hiring interns, but were willing to try, some had programs already. I ended up getting lucky with the Hospital, and it turned out to be a perfect experience for me at the time.

As far as your question about internships out of school, I doubt you'll be able to find one as they are mostly looking for students. But that's not to say its impossible. My state, Rhode Island, launched an IT Apprentice Engineer program a few years back and partnered with a local IT company to make it happen. It involves 1 year of training, with 12 weeks being classroom led and the rest being an OJT. My advice would be to see if your state offers anything like that.

Other than that, for a quick pickup job to get some cash in your pocket, id recommend call center style jobs. They usually pickup techs with certs fast, but the work and pay usually blow. There is a company in Mass called PlumChoice that came out to my school trying to recruit. They were offering a "work from home" employment option where you field calls to your personal computer and troubleshoot remotely. I think it was at $13hr to start, they provided training and a headset, you provide a PC.

All else fails, sell your skills on craigslist, you'd be surprised at how much business you can get for simple problems, and its pretty much all profit!

mxmaniac

That websitelsud00d linked to is great, may have found something worth applying to down the road.

I'm wondering, if some internships are paid, and have benefits, etc. Then what exactly makes them an "internship", rather than just a "job" or"temp contract"?

As far as options of being an "apprentice", does such a thing even exist? I looked into this in great detail before, but found nothing, except something in some far away country like australia. I think apprenticeship is how everything should be. You work doing the basic tasks, while going to school, and slowly expanding your knowledge. For some strange reason though apprenticeships only seem to exist with construction and physical labor jobs. I don't know why. I'd love an IT apprenticeship if it existed.

jofas88

The apprenticeship I'm speaking of is the first of its kind in my state, not sure about nationwide. The company is Atrion, and its an official apprenticeship approved by the state. Its for cisco networking and windows server administration. I agree though, with how hot the IT field is, there should be a lot more "apprentice" style programs out there. As far as the internship I had, it was minimum wage, max 20hrs a week and no benefits. You'll find a combo of paid and unpaid work for internships. I think what seperates internships from being called jobs is that an internship is temporary in nature and you are operating under the guise that you are a student in training, kind of like a real employee with training wheels on.