SmartBrief, Washington, DC
This summer, I worked full-time as an Editorial Intern at SmartBrief Inc. in Washington, DC. As a leading digital media publisher, SmartBrief disseminates morning newsletters to over six million subscribers, many of them executives or members of the business world. While I had all kinds of duties and responsibilities throughout my two-month internship, my main responsibility was to assist a handful of editors on an as-need basis with various administrative tasks. This often included duties like managing company Twitter accounts, editing original content and uploading it to the website, creating a master deadline calendar, and even writing some original content. In addition, all of the summer interns (eight in total) were tasked with a large overarching project that ultimately culminated in a 30-minute presentation in front of management and our supervisors at the end of the summer. As a result, I spent roughly half my time working in the Editorial department and the other half meeting with the other interns to make progress on our project. This project’s big question was to determine how the company could grow its audience without enlisting the aid of its many association partnerships. After being given some guidelines, we had six weeks to come up with ideas and then put together a cohesive, well-rehearsed presentation. The third main component of this internship was a Leadership Lunch series. Every Monday, the interns were joined for lunch by the members of a different division of the company (e.g. Sales, Tech, Editorial, etc.). This was a great opportunity not only to meet many new faces but also to learn about every facet of the business. Overall, I gained valuable exposure to the ins and outs of the content side of a digital media publishing company. In addition, I was also able to exercise my creativity and decision-making skills, most notably on the group project. The balance between exposure, creative opportunities, and skills development made my time as a summer intern at SmartBrief valuable and incredibly rewarding.
I have only good things to say about the people in the organization. First, I should mention Tom Sikes ’11 who works at SmartBrief as a Group Publisher. After discovering the company on LinkedIn sometime back in March, I connected with Tom and set up a time to talk on the phone. We had a great conversation and he was very helpful in shedding light on SmartBrief and the internship program more specifically. He encouraged me to apply and I have him to thank for my summer internship experience. In addition, all of the people at the company that figured prominently in my internship experience were incredibly welcoming, flexible, patient, and helpful. The two people in charge of the internship program, Kwanza Nunn and Janis Becker were both accommodating and facilitated a positive experience all around. Outside the office, interns had the opportunity to participate in various company events such as softball games on the National Mall and a boat cruise at the end of the summer. I was very pleasantly surprised at how welcoming and inclusive the full time employees acted towards the interns. They really treated us like full time employees for the time that we spent there. I was also struck by the tight-knit community that transcended whichever individual department an employee happened to work in. People seemed to have a relationship with most other people in the office including management. Although SmartBrief employees were busy with work throughout the day, it was not uncommon for friendly side conversations to occur or for a handful of people to gather in the Cafe to watch part of a World Cup game for instance. Without a doubt, the company culture was definitely one of the more positive aspects of my time at SmartBrief.
One can ascertain without too much effort or difficulty that news media plays an absolutely critical role in our society today. In a democratic society, the people are tasked with voting to settle both important and controversial issues. Ensuring that the electorate is informed with accurate, relevant, and unbiased information is essential to creating and maintaining a well-functioning society. In this vein, news aggregators like SmartBrief have an extremely important role to play. Not only is SmartBrief responsible for disseminating news to millions of business decision-makers every single day, but SmartBrief also chooses what news to prioritize and emphasize. Maintaining a reputation as a reliable and effective aggregator of unbiased news is central to the SmartBrief business model. As someone who is potentially interested in pursuing a career in journalism, I found it valuable to hear from upper-level employees at SmartBrief about how they navigate the various challenges of the media world. On the one hand, SmartBrief is a private business, meaning that making money is obviously at the heart of the company’s mission. But everyone that works there is also well aware of the importance and responsibility that comes with being a serious player in the news media world.
This internship will definitely leave a lasting impact on me, particularly with regard to how I approach my senior year at Williams. Full time desk jobs are not always the most exciting and any full-fledged member of the working world will tell you that there are always unglamorous aspects to any job. After this summer, I feel more motivated than ever to take full advantage of the creative opportunities given to all students at Williams both within the academic and non-academic arenas. Having a job can often be somewhat singular and narrow in its focus. While I only have one more year at Williams, I want to try as many things as possible and keep searching for new things that interest me. Furthermore, this internship was the first time I ever had to work together with seven other people on a substantial project that had some real stakes. This presented many challenges, some of which took weeks and lots of active problem solving to overcome. There were many lessons from this experience that I will be sure to take with me back to Williams and whatever industry I end up in after graduation. In terms of career orientation, this internship solidified my interest in journalism and news media. However, seeing the realities of the professional world up close, I also feel incredibly motivated to spend the next couple of years pushing myself outside my comfort zone, whether by travelling, moving to a completely different region of the country, or perhaps even trying something totally new.
I would like to end by thanking the Class of 1972 who made this summer internship experience possible for me. Washington, DC is an expensive place to live and I would not have been able to make it all work without the aid of the Alumni Sponsored Internship Program. I am extremely appreciative to Williams and the ’68 Center for Career Exploration for opening up so many doors for me.