Interns: Five Terrible Pieces of Good Advice

First up - there are clearly some stone-cold pimps using Merriam Webster Online. This made me chuckle:

Yes.. I've changed the title and look for the third time in as many posts. I'm new to this, OK? That and the 'Noughties' ended two years ago. oops.

After Tuesday's post I thought I could do one better. I don't mean to come down hard on internships, but they do tend to fuck-over the unprepared. Here it is then:

Brammo's Five Terrible Pieces of Advice to Graduates and Interns which Actually Aren't Bad

1 - Turn Down Internships
Be picky and know what you're getting into

Like I said on Tuesday, it all comes down to selection. By all means, apply to as many vacancies as you want. Shit, go to the interviews. BUT - ASK QUESTIONS. Do your research. Find other people who've done the same thing before you.. and avoid like the bloody plague any back-office admin jobs. Nothing is going to put you off a whole professional field, dissuade you from looking for another job, or convince you to try cordless bungee-jumping faster than spending eight hours a day doing data-entry on Microsoft Excel.

Don't look at pay exclusively - money will come later. My last placement was UNPAID - but because it was unpaid, I was allowed to get involved in all aspects of the business. If a company is paying you, they can justify making you the coffee girl or the mailroom boy. If you're working for FREE, then they'd damn well better be able to justify it with 1 - a kickass reference and 2 - a portfolio of decent experience.

2 - Take up smoking

Yes, I'm fucking serious.

Unless you've been living under a rock for the last decade, you'll know by now that smoking is unquestionably a good thing. It looks cool, feels great and gives you an excuse to meet drunk women huddling outside nightclubs.
This last point is what's important - it's no surprise that a ton of people took up 'social smoking' when the ban came in.. suddenly clubs and bars started providing a nice quiet area for people to stand around and chat. For some reason, human cultures tend to place emphasis on the social benefits of 'collectively polluting your bodies' - peace pipes, opium dens, pubs, college, and of course, the office fag break.
Networking is probably the most important part of an internship - and nothing guarantees a captive audience like a cigarette. Catch the manager/director/CEO lighting up, and they're forced to stand and chat idly for five minutes. Repeatedly. Sometimes more than once a day. They have no choice but to get to know you, or stop smoking. I guarantee you, your company is more tolerable than nicotine withdrawal. Cigarettes generate social capital - they can be bummed and lent, forming debt bonds that transcend the office hierarchy.

But for God's sake.. Don't want to smoke? FAKE IT. Otherwise you have no reason to be out there other than to chat, and that shit's just creepy.

3 - Overstep the Mark

You have nothing to lose - impressing people takes balls

"Nothing ventured - nothing gained" goes the old mantra, and nowhere is this more true than in your junior level of work. Businesses always state that they're looking for people who are proactive, who take the initiative, and who are capable of working without direction. This isn't just jargon. Internships these days often play out like 3-month job interviews - the hope is that at the end of those months, you've caught the attention of someone who will ask you to stay on at the company (hence why making buddies out of all the smokers is a flawless strategy).
Part of this means going above and beyond the job description. No matter what the task, it can be improved upon. Think like a problem solver. If you're given a boring task that takes ages, think of how it could be made to go faster. Any idea that improves efficiency, or reduces cost, or best of all makes more money, you should immediately take it upon yourself to try it out.  But... DON'T ASK PERMISSION. As long as you're prepared to undo everything you did if the boss doesn't like it, go right ahead and make those changes.
It sounds counter-intuitive, and yes if it's genuinely a massive change that will take ages to sort out, then it's better to draw up a plan and submit it to a superior. This will still gain brownie points.
However, if you can go to your supervisor at the end of the day with a list of the things that you've DONE, along with how you can restore things to how they were, then you will immediately go into the 'plausible candidate' pile. People that do their work blindly, without thinking about the task they are doing, are not competitive prospects for the few job slots that are currently available.

4 - The office is 'A Game of Thrones'
so be ANYBODY but Sean Bean.

Edit: except that little prick Joffrey

So yes, competition and rivalry are all part of internships. Sometimes you'll be the only person in the position, sometimes there will be ten of you. If you ARE the only person in the internship at the time, don't forget that you're competing against whoever was there before you (and whoever's coming afterwards). It's important to make sure you stand out, and that you're playing the game better than everyone around you. Network harder (smoke more?). Take more risks.

And it's an old cliche, but nice guys finish last. Note that I didn't say WORK harder. Everything in the first few months is about appearances. You need to SHOW that you're being proactive, so make sure you aren't keeping quiet if you've gone above and beyond your job description. If you're producing group work, make sure your name's on the top of the list. Don't disappear out of the office at 5:00 on the dot in a swirl of papers.. take it slow. Make a tea, chat to people about their plans for the weekend, and wait for at least 2/3rds of the other interns to leave first. And NEVER.. NEVER assume that because you get on with the other juniors that they aren't just waiting gimp-rape you like it's Pulp Fiction. I've been sent for review over comments I made about one of the company directors (of the 'Cat Funt' variety) to another intern in the pub after work! Even if you don't play the cut-throat, don't assume that because you're doing well that other people won't try to drag you down. Until you've signed that contract, keep smiling, but don't trust a bloody soul.

5 - Play Endgame

This is pretty much a combination of the above four. Once you've chosen your internship, you know that the only guarantee is that it will end. You're in there, for however long, to make the most out of it. A huge amount of people forget that a temporary contract means you can never genuinely go wrong. Its OK to piss off a couple of people by being too pushy with the networking. It's very unlikely they're going to fire you, for the sake of cutting short a few weeks of your employment, because you were too insistent about having a chat. You stand to lose nothing by trying to shake up the jobs they give you, to improve them or to think about them in an abstract way. And you definitely shouldn't be afraid to be clear about what you want. If your reference sucks, ask them to improve it. If someone's pissing you off, don't keep quiet about it. Ultimately, you should treat internships as though they are going to end, and you're not going to get the job. No, don't act like a prick.. but certainly don't reserve anything. Squeeze that sucker for all it's worth, and if you happen to get a job out of it - great.