9 steps to landing your first tech internship
from a current Software Engineer@ Google
Phase 1: The Prep Work
#1 —Organize
Be proactive about the recruiting process in college. Know when your career fair is if your school hosts one and plan out which companies you want to meet in advance. Keep track of EVERY application you fill out and the people that you meet. I used this tracker in college while I went through the process.
#2 — Reflect
Most interviews will have a behavioral component where the interviewers are trying to get to know who you are. Think of 4–5 impactful experiences or projects in your life and see if you can answer the prompts in the first column for each of them.
There are also 3 commonly asked questions/themes that you should be prepared to answer.
#3— Study
Know your data structures well and make sure you’re thoroughly familiar with Big-O. If you need a refresher, check out this Tech Interview Cheat Sheet and the Big-O Algorithm Complexity Chart. Test yourself on leetcode.com.
To get a deeper understanding of the material, read at least one of the 4 tech prep books listed below. When you feel comfortable, run through practice interview questions with your peers. The two websites listed below provide a space for you to schedule practice interviews with others who are also practicing for tech interviews.
#4— Apply, Apply, Apply
At the end of the day, landing your first internship is a numbers game. I went to both the fall and spring career fairs. Applied to roughly 190 roles. Never heard back from ~60 of the companies, got rejected from 120 companies, interviewed at 7 and got offers from 2 companies. The more hands and eyes you get your resume in front of, the higher your chances of getting an internship are.
Phase 2: The Interview Stuff
#5 — Elevate Yourself
Practice your elevator pitch — this is a 30-second introduction that answers the question “Tell me about yourself”! This is your hook when you meet an employee. You want them to WANT to work with you. I personally included some tech interests, and something fun that I do outside of tech.
#6 — Interview Homework
Look up your interviewer on LinkedIn if you were given a name — is there something in common between the two of you?
Has the company been in the news lately? Did you read an interesting article about a product/feature that the company has launched? Check out their blog post if they have one — show that you genuinely are interested in the workplace!
What do you LOVE about the company? An initiative that they’ve taken on, a specific role?
#7 — The Night Before
Prep your materials so you’re not scrambling for them 5 minutes before the interview. Have your water, resume, paper & pen for notes ready to go.
If it is a video interview, confirm that you’ve installed the software you’re meeting on. Test your video and microphone to ensure that they are working and have a pair of headphones ready.
Let your roommates or anyone in your home know that you have an interview so that there aren’t any surprise disturbances!
#8 — Answering Behavioral Interviews
When asked an open-ended behavioral question, think back to the experiences you charted out earlier. Do one of those anecdotes fit the theme of the question? As you begin answering the question, use the STAR framework to give some structure to the story.
#9 — Answering Tech Interviews
The most important thing to do while solving a technical problem is think out loud. These two videos coach you through how to navigate this successfully.
Once you’ve completed your interview phases, make sure you update your tracker and keep up with any follow-up emails. Finding your way to your first internship can be a long and scary process, but these templates hopefully provide some structure to guide you through it. Good luck out there :)
