The Summer Intern Journey at Real Chemistry
Act I – Introduction: Our First Week at Real Chemistry
The excitement from your acceptance letter has dwindled and nervousness has set in. In the weeks building up to starting your Real Chemistry internship, you can’t help but question your placement in the company, your abilities, your time management skills and your wits. How am I supposed to wake up before 9 a.m. every morning? What happens if I report two minutes late to my direct manager? What are “billable hours”? Your mind is abuzz with questions, but you realize you’re not alone. On the first day, you meet with 65 fellow interns, and the pressure of a new internship doesn’t seem as daunting anymore. At least you won’t be the only one making mistakes. Meeting your direct manager lessens the pressure even more, as you now have someone to guide you through your journey. The completion of your first week feels like an accomplishment in and of itself because you overcame the fear of starting a new job, and you were welcomed into a team of incredibly talented individuals as one of them – another incredibly talented individual.
Act II – Rising Action: Handling an Influx of Assignments and Learning Time Management
Soon you’re meeting other people on your team, your first project rolls into your lap, and you think, “This isn’t so nerve-wracking.” You decide to go into the office and introduce yourself to your team members. You were nervous about walking up to other Real Chemistry managers and even senior leaders and introducing yourself. Once you did though, you realized how great of an opportunity it was. You share with them a little bit about your experience as an intern at Real Chemistry and how great it has been so far, and you can tell that they are truly listening to your thoughts and observations. Now it’s time to begin working with clients, which is one of the scariest parts. Client work must be perfect, and you don’t want to mess anything up. The expectations are high because client projects directly improve the lives of patients. You want to make sure you are a good communicator, but you don’t want to seem overbearing. You begin to get more calendar invites and more assignments, asking yourself, “What happens when I have two meetings at once?!” It's time to learn how to manage your time. You want to be reliable, but you don’t know if you can manage all of the assignments you have been given. You take a deep breath and perform all of your assigned tasks. Things are going smoothly. You begin to get the hang of Excel query writing, drafting media pitches, and analyzing data. You feel as though you are being a help to your team and not a hindrance. Nothing can go wrong…at least not in the first two weeks.
Act III – Climax: Your First Mistake
Maybe you called someone by the wrong name or forgot to mute yourself during a Zoom call as your roommate started to loudly play Taylor Swift. Maybe you chose the wrong word, or you used the wrong data query, leading to the resulting data being completely irrelevant to your project. Now, your direct manager has asked you to restart the assignment. Did you just spend two hours on this query for nothing? “Eek!” You buckle down and start over, correcting your error. You share these mistakes with your fellow interns, your roommate, maybe your mom, and they reassure you that it's not that bad! The common saying “it is a learning process, and we all make mistakes” is true, but you can’t help but want to be the exception to that cliché.
Act IV – Falling Action: Growing from That Mistake
You smile as you begin to improve and hear “great job” more and more. Suddenly, the embarrassment, the fear, the incessant “I should have reviewed my work” that’s been ruminating in your head as soon as you made one mistake – that finally subsides. You realize the even more cliché “everybody makes mistakes, everybody has those days, everybody gets that way” is a true philosophical statement by Hannah Montana that should be taken at face value. Making a mistake didn’t tarnish your image. Rather, it was a wonderful opportunity that made you more knowledgeable. Reflecting on and learning from your errors, followed by implementing those learnings, is a core part of the internship experience. To critically evaluate your work, the good and the bad, and to establish a new understanding of your work is the most beneficial part of any job. After all, nothing in life worth doing is easy. Why not appreciate the personal growth that comes along with making a mistake? You now understand why they ask you in interviews to “tell me a time you made a mistake in a job and how you learned from it.”
Act V – Resolution: Reflection on the Intern Journey
A twinge of sadness washes over you as you realize it’s now your last day with Real Chemistry. Those 10 weeks flew by without you even realizing it – 10 weeks of growth, excitement, team bonding, and, most importantly, learning what it means to make a difference in patients’ lives. Thinking back to your first hours as an intern, you can’t help but laugh at all the worries you have conquered and all the problems you have figured out how to solve. From needing your direct manager to walk you through a project, to now being the sole editor across multiple brands, you look back with pride. Not only have you traversed a path of immense career growth, but you have played an important role in helping shape the future of patient-centered health care. In just 10 weeks, you became an integral part in ensuring that patients are fully educated about their treatment options and fully respected as agents of change in their health care journeys. You have been a part of changing the future for the better. On your last day, as you say goodbye for now to your direct manager, coworkers and friends, a bittersweet feeling fills you. But you know this is not the end, not even close. This is just the beginning.
