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Announcing the Freshview Internship Program
Posted by David Greiner on July 26, 2007 5:15 PM
Before Ben and I graduated back in 2000, we were required to do two sessions of at least 2-3 months work experience in "the real world" as part of our degree. I always thought this was a fantastic idea. It gave you an opportunity to meet potential employers, and also get a taste for what the next stage in your life would probably be like.
It was up to the students to approach the company they wanted to work for. Some students landed spots in reasonable companies, but many ended up doing horribly boring work like data entry or fixing someone else's bugs. Even if you landed a spot in a "good company" (usually a big bank or consulting firm back then), the work wasn't much more interesting and you never really got a chance to get your hands dirty with an actual project. Not only that, but most of the time they didn't pay you a cent for stealing 10 weeks of your life.
From an employer's perspective, internships can be a fantastic way to attract great talent early and keep it. As experience shows, there's so many ways of doing it wrong, and only a few ways to do it right. With that in mind, we stepped back into our student shoes to put together our dream internship program. If I was a 2nd year computer science student again, what would I want out of my time in the workforce?
A well defined, real world project
I want to be working on something real. Something tangible that people are actually going to use. Under the guidance of our development team, our interns will be given the task of developing a significant new feature for one of our products. This will be a shippable feature used by tens of thousands of people in more than 100 countries. They won't be bored.
Exposure
When I was studying, most of my fellow students were thrown into a small department within a much larger company. They were never really given an opportunity to see the entire process of developing and selling software. We're a small company. You can fit our design, marketing, support and admin team in a mini van with room to move. As well as developing real software, our interns will be exposed to marketing our software, testing, writing documentation and even talking to customers.
All the trimmings
I still remember horror stories from those doing long and incredibly boring hours for little to no money. Although unpaid internships are quite common, we'll be paying $800/week. On top of this, you'll have a fridge full of free food and soft drink, be invited to our monthly company outings and will need to be available for a ping pong challenge at a moments notice.
What's the catch?
There's only one. You need to be awesome. We're very fussy about who we hire and will be just as picky for our interns. Does this sound like you?
- Top grades (at least a distinction average).
- Some experience with software development, the more the better. Perhaps you've already written your own apps or contributed to another project.
- In your second or third year of a computer science or related degree.
We've written more about the program, including how you can apply on the official Intern Program page. We'll post an update here when the 2-3 spots have been filled.
Got anything to add?