Listen to Monica (MEM 2020) talk about her internship experience at an energy consulting firm this past summer.

Stephanie: You're listening to Gear Up, the Duke Career Centers student produced podcast showcasing real student summer internship experiences. My name is Stephanie, and today, we're talking to Monica about her internship at an energy consulting firm this past summer.

Monica: Hi, everyone. My name is Monica. I'm a second year in MEM Masters of Environmental Management student down at the Nicholas School of the Environment with a concentration of energy and environment. And here, I'd like to share a little bit of my summer experience at an energy consulting firm.

Stephanie: And where were you located, at this consulting firm?

Monica: So I was at the Northern Virginia area. So in the DMV area.

Stephanie: And what were you doing specifically or what position did you hold there?

Monica: So my position was called a commercial energy intern. So basically how it works was each intern was assigned to a specific energy specialized team. There was an intern that's in the electricity markets team. I was at the natural gas team. So that was a fun experience. And this exposure was really good to not only the energy sector, but from a more consulting perspective, which is pretty unique in my personal opinion.

Stephanie: Yeah. And how did you find out about this position? How did you become aware that it was available?

Monica: So I found out about this position during an event held by which is a joint event down at Duke. It's called Energy Week. So Energy Week, it's actually coming up. So the company that I was interning at was there at the career fair and they were also there at a coffee chat. So aside to a fair, there's this separate event where there are coffee chats happening. They occur for about 15 minutes, five students per room. And then that way you can actually have an intimate conversation with the company and really learn about what they do. So that is where I built momentum. I personally introduced myself. I expressed my interest. And that was after that was pretty much a snowball effect of, well, the cliché, quote unquote, networking. So that's how I found out about it.

Stephanie: And so what exactly were you doing sort of like day-to-day in the office?

Monica: So I think it will be easier if I just walk through my life from the beginning of my day to the end of my day. So I would arrive, let's say, at 9:00, 9:30 a.m. and then grab a coffee and then check my emails. So my team was pretty small, was cut like in the office. There was like four people and we also had offices outside the country. So we would, I would have a check in with my manager and see if there were any ad hoc tasks that I had to do, because the thing is being an intern. So this is a real, really unique internship experience because each intern had their own individual intern project where they had to work on for three months. And at the end of the internship, you present it in front of the whole floor, which is pretty much intimidating, but that was a really good learning experience. But as I said that you also have ad hoc tasks like tasks on the fly, like Monica, can you like write a quick summary of these policies. Can you do a quick Google search of what policies are what changes are happening in the markets? Like just see what's happening on the news, synthesize them into points. So that was like, I would say a 30 percent portion of my day-to-day tasks. And once that's done, like there is also flexibility and fluidity. Like if I could tell my manager, like I kind of want to focus on my intern project today. So he would understand and kind of like limit those ad hoc tasks. So, um, a day-to-day, like maybe if I had time and I was kind of bored of doing my project, I would say, do you have anything for me to work on? So he would give me these tasks of even just editing. Or maybe like can you check out this blog post draft and see