Intern-management & the steep learning curve in mentorship

It was 2022 January when I told my then boss that I, as the sole marketing person at my dynamic & fun film distribution company, couldn't handle the scope of the work alone.

It was during our yearly review, just after my 6 month probation period where I asked her for assistance, an intern. My boss had previously promised that she'd provide me any help I'd need. She did as she said and I'm really grateful, but what ended up happening was that I was also put in-charge of intern procurement.

Within months I went from being a newly employed undergraduate at her first job to being an internship coordinator. My job scope (even prior to signing on an intern) consisted of:

1. Writing job descriptions
2. Connecting with tertiary educations to tap into their pool of students for internship opportunities
3. Screening & shortlisting resumes on LinkedIn, school platforms and others
4. Scheduling interviews with my colleagues
5. Interviewing potential interns
6. Deciding on interns

Essentially, throughout the next year I'd go on to do this routine almost 5 times and I ended up supervising 4 unique interns in that time.

The first intern taught me many things about not just supervising work & projects, but about my own job as well. Because in making the templates, learning materials, timelines & project briefings for her, I had to streamline my own processes. This in turn made me more efficient in understanding my own skillsets & tasks on my plate. However, I only had my first intern for a couple of months and she was not able to assist with all the duties that the job required. Therefore I also learned the art of delegation & tailoring work to different people's needs.

My second intern taught me how to trust & learn and lean on others for support. She was an amazing task worker who could grasp essential concepts faster than anyone I've seen, and she understood the job better than me in a much shorter time. This experience taught me that sometimes I don't need to spend lots of time explaining and perhaps a better way to teach someone was to give them (my intern) room to explore and figure out their own method of doing things. Turns out, they could totally find easier ways than I knew how and in turn teach me many new things. I had a wonderful time learning from her and she taught me critical skills that I still treasure til now.

My third intern was with me the longest. She taught me so much about mentorship, about being sensitive to other's struggles, about having empathy etc. Most importantly, she taught me how to toe the line between being the fun employer and being strict on deadlines.

Generally, I'd tried my best to be understanding because I too was once an intern and I knew that there were days with night classes, homework, courses etc on top of the 9-5 gig. I wasn't the kind of supervisor that minded untidiness or others taking naps in the office, and I always strived to be more friendly and casual than strict. However, there was a time when I needed to pull back and be stern and professional, and while it was uncomfortable to me at first, it had to be done, as I had to take accountability for both myself and my intern's work.

Balancing between being a 'chill' mentor and being a professional one was a learning curve for me. I had to rely on my JC experience of being a VP of a CCA to know when to give critical feedback and when to provide a listening ear. I approached this experience with honesty at the start and I think both of us were better off for it.

I trusted my interns to tell me if something was not working for them, and if something was wrong in the way I supervised as much as they trusted me enough to ask me for help not just with work but with their studies.

In the end, I think I learned more from the experience than what I taught to my interns. I learned that each individual has specific skillsets: some were more artistic, some more detail orientated, some were writers etc. I became adaptable in my teaching methods due to their difference in needs of communication.

I learned how to accommodate for learning processes in between work deadline. Because I needed to give them time to do a task, then for me to feedback and time for them to change it, grow from it and re-attempt it.

I learned how to give praise and critique without judgement, but only for teaching purposes. I also crucially learned how to leave room for my own mistakes as well and be open to new perspectives.

Each one of my interns, no matter how little time I spent with them, told me of their own dreams, passions and pursuits and I like to think that our time together made all of us better off for it.

I honestly do believe that anyone can learn anything, if only they're taught it in the right way for them. And I really do want to keep learning in life from everyone I meet, be it my mentors or my mentees.