Olivia’s Intern Connect Journey: From Intern to Committee Member

When it comes to internships, I took the non-traditional path. During my days as an undergraduate at Grand Valley State University, I was involved in many aspects of campus life, including being a Resident Assistant, Leadership for Alternative Breaks and Laker Traditions Team. An internship wasn’t on my radar. As a Marketing major, my degree didn’t require an internship so that wasn’t top of mind for me. So, when Senior Year rolled around, I started applying for what felt like every entry level Marketing job in Michigan. Nothing was quite panning out the way I had hoped—which is a panic that I’m sure most people can still feel as they read this.

A friend of mine referred me to an internship at a company where she had been an intern while in school. She shared with me that the company had a great culture, close-knit team and would offer me good hands-on experience. Of course, that all sounded ideal to me, but I couldn’t get past the thought in my head that “You are supposed to do internships during college, not once you graduate.” I found myself so paralyzed in what I thought was the one correct way to move forward after college. If I’m honest, the title of Intern, and how that would make me look in a sea of my friends posting about the full-time roles they were landing, was preventing me from even looking into this internship as an option.

Luckily, my friend was persistent and because she knew me so well, she pushed me to at least do an interview. Thinking that it couldn’t hurt for the interview experience, I set up the interview. Low and behold, I immediately connected with the people that I met in the interview process—how they talked about culture and the ways they were looking to develop their interns. I accepted that internship and started one week after graduation.

One element of their internship curriculum that would go on to continue to influence my growth and perspective was the Annual Intern Connect Conference. I attended this conference along with the other two women in my intern class, on a hot day, in the middle of the summer in 2018 in downtown Grand Rapids. This year in particular, the conference was held on the lawn in front of the Gerald R Fold Presidential Museum. I remember walking up and immediately being taken aback by just the sheer number of other interns in attendance. To be honest, I didn’t even realize there were that many interns in the area. Especially coming from a smaller company, we had a different experience from the army of 50 interns we saw from one company all in coordinated merch. As you’d expect, we did a loop first just to get the lay of the land, get some food from the food trucks and then dove in.

This afternoon was such an impactful experience for me. Getting to hear about specific topics that don’t otherwise come up in day-to-day work—validating that things like soft skills are just as important to learn as hard skills. Forcing myself to network even when it’s uncomfortable is something I’m still working on, frankly. Because when you’re in a sea of people who are all in the same stage of life or feeling uncomfortable, you’re suddenly not as afraid of putting yourself out there. Even getting an opportunity to learn about other companies that I didn’t know about was valuable as someone like me who is originally from the East side of Michigan. Would you believe that I also met another intern who had graduated recently, then started an internship? The short conversation I had with her did so much to reassure me that everyone’s journey looks different and there is no one right way to do anything. That sense of community, confidence, and feeling like I had input to give West Michigan is something I continue to push myself to remember, and that seed started at Intern Connect.

Fast forward… now 7 years later and I work at an innovative, culture-first community-minded company in the heart of Grand Rapids. I’ve worked in Talent Acquisition, Sales, and now Human Resources. Proving another lesson that your degree is so important, but never limit yourself to the type of job or industry you might end up in. I am now also a member of the Annual Intern Connect Conference committee and am coordinating my 4^th cohort of company interns to send to Intern Connect this summer.  It was such a full circle moment for me when I was asked to join the committee that plans this event. I had to dig up the old photo of myself that was taken at intern connect back in that summer of 2018 and smile at how much growth started that day and where I am now.

Intern Connect is still having an impact on hundreds of our region’s interns, over 600+ last year alone. The reach is growing, the content evolves, and topics are chosen to reflect real time questions and feedback from interns who attended in the years past. These topics allow interns to think in a new way and have a larger conversation outside of what their internship curriculum may cover. For anyone who is an intern or who leads interns—even if you were part of a small team like I was—you will not regret taking advantage of this opportunity. There is no other event that gets this volume of interns together in one space. Interns will have the opportunity to not only bond as a company intern group, but meet new people, learn about new employers and leave with takeaways that are both inspirational and tangible for their life stage. Let’s help this great young talent grow in new ways, see the beauty of our West Michigan Business community, and spark their confidence in a new way.

I find so much joy sending my company’s interns to intern connect each year and now that I’m the one running the intern program, they too get to go in cool company merch. So, here’s to community, full circle moments, and building up our next generation of Leaders. See you at Intern Connect!

 

This blog post was written by guest author, Olivia Mulder. She works as a People Generalist at Twisthink, and she serves on the committee for Intern Connect 2025.