Surviving Your First Busy Season Internship
It's that time of year again! The time where many students get their first exposure to public accounting through an internship. Busy season internships can be stressful because the intern is in an environment where the people they are working with are working long hours to meet important deadlines. Today I'm going to share some tips on how to survive your busy season internship with no prior experience.
Tip #1 - Take Notes
Two of the most important things that busy season interns learn is that 1) there is a lot of information for them to take on and 2) the people they are working with don’t have time to explain the same thing to them multiple times. To address both of these, it is critical that interns take good notes while working. A great strategy that interns can utilize is taking notes and then reading them back to the person they are working with. Doing this will help clarify everything before the work is started. Many aspects of public accounting require certain details to be correct, and you will probably not remember all those details without taking notes. Even if it takes a little longer to get everything down, it’s better to have good notes before starting than to ask your senior to repeat everything an hour later when you get stuck.
Tip #2 - Ask Questions
Many interns want to make it seem like they are smart and understand everything that is being told to them the first time. Unfortunately this can lead to the intern not asking any questions out of the fear that they sound dumb or like they were not listening properly. In my experience, the best interns are the ones who ask good questions about the areas they are working on with the goal of gaining a better understanding and getting the job done. It’s important to remember that as an intern you will likely know nothing about the work you are about to be assigned and it's likely to be something you've never seen before, so asking questions is a key part of learning and getting the work done effectively. The key to asking good questions is to keep the following in mind:
Try not to ask the same question twice - most of the time, asking the same question twice implies that you were not listening the first time. A good way to make sure you aren’t repeating questions is to take notes!
Be mindful of the other person’s time - the other person has their own workload that they need to get done, and that typically doesn’t include responding to the intern’s questions.
Don’t get stuck - If you are at a point where you won’t be able to do anything else unless your question is answered, ask it immediately! Most of the time, your coworkers would much rather take the time to answer a question and keep you moving than let you go unutilized.
Tip #3 - Maintain a Positive Attitude
Your attitude is the most important thing early on in your career in public accounting. As a busy season intern, your attitude will make or break your experience. Having little to no public accounting experience and coming into busy season will be challenging since everything will be new to you. The best interns that I have worked with are those that understand this challenge and meet it with a positive attitude. Even if they didn't get something at first, they were willing to politely ask questions and try again. By contrast, the worst interns were the ones who thought that they were "too good" or "too smart" for the work that they were doing. Most of the time, those interns did not produce the best work product and were simply not enjoyable to work with.
In addition to these three tips, be sure to consistently communicate with the people you are working with, including checking in when you run out of work and when you plan to leave for the day. Keeping an open line of communication will help you address any other issues you might experience during your internship. Thanks for reading and good luck with your internship!