Summer Jobs Are Your First Shot at the "Grown-Up World." Soak Up as Much as You Can.

With summer jobs on the horizon, professionals recall the first jobs that launched their careers. Read more, then write your own #CareerLaunch post.

Cool Heat: That’s where I had my very first summer job. It was a small, local heating and air-conditioning installation company, and I spent a summer there as a bookkeeper while in college. I guess everyone remembers their first job, and I suspect that for everyone, as for me, that first job constituted a lesson in life: your first shot at the “grown-up world,” your first boss, a chance to see how business actually gets done and how people really work — not to mention your first “real” lesson in having to show up on time and to stay at work till the work is done. I had a wonderful experience that summer, and it set me up to want more like it.

My next internship was for then-Congressman-now-U.S. Senator Ben Cardin. While it was easy to get distracted by the social experience of working alongside dozens of other college interns and walking the halls of the most powerful buildings in the U.S., I concentrated on trying to differentiate myself by the level of effort I put in, my curiosity, and by consistently asking to do more work. In fact, looking back on that experience, which I loved, I can see how my persistent bugging of the Congressman’s staff, asking for more work to do, may have been pretty annoying at times. Their generosity in responding to me, however, was a lesson in itself. That’s what internships are supposed to be, after all: they’re learning experiences.

In fact, the intern’s job is even more important for what you bring to it and what you do with it. It’s the opportunity where you first have a chance to add value — even with the most basic skills and responsibilities — and to prove to yourself and to your manager that you are ready for the next stage in life. Internships are your chance to get your professional life off to a good start.

In the summer after I graduated from my MBA program, I came to Nasdaq as an intern and went from there to President and COO — of course, after many years of gradually expanding responsibilities and different tests of my abilities. But I never forgot my own intern experiences and the sense of responsibility, respect for work, and the preparation for life that those early job experiences afforded me; it’s one reason we at Nasdaq pay so much attention to and place so much value on our own internship program.

In fact, when I think about the Nasdaq interns who have come up through the ranks over the years, it’s clear that the internship program is as essential for us in leadership as it is for the interns themselves — maybe more so. It’s a chance to see who stands out and why, and what I’ve noted over the years is that our “rockstar interns” have shared four attributes in particular — attributes that have nothing to do with specific achievements but everything to do with behavior and attitude. I recommend these attributes for all interns in any organization in any industry:

First, intellectual curiosity. The stand-out interns show an interest in the business and a passion for learning all they can from the intern experience.

Second, an eagerness to execute whatever is asked of them. Rockstar interns show us that they believe they can learn something from every task. If they’re asked to do data entry, they’re scoping out what the data is and figuring out why it’s needed. If they’re tasked to answer phones or conduct Internet research for a new project, they approach the assignment as an adventure in the best sense of the word — a chance to acquire or perfect a new skill or new knowledge. While our interns have many opportunities for meaningful projects and contributions, there are always elements of internships that include entry-level work, and that work should be embraced as enthusiastically as the substantive assignments.

Third, respect for the chain of command and the lines of reporting. A corporate organization is a hierarchy for good reason, so while you may have lots of questions you’d like to ask the CEO, seeking a one-on-one meeting with him or her is overreaching — and shows there is something about corporations you just don’t get. On the other hand, it makes sense to carve out some time on your direct manager’s calendar, if he or she has the time to carve, in order to solicit advice about how to navigate the business and to ask those burning questions about the business itself. Eagerness tempered with respect for your assigned manager’s workload and responsibilities is a great way to demonstrate that you understand what it takes to work in a corporate environment — and it is likely to be viewed very positively.

Finally, lack of ego and general friendliness go a long way not only toward making friends — both among your fellow interns and with permanent employees — but also toward inspiring a manager to assign you the more interesting work. Believe me when I say that the plum jobs are reserved for those interns who demonstrate an ability to collaborate with peers, not for those who strive mightily to stand out by demonstrating how smart they are. All high-handedness gets you is everyone rooting for you to fail. I never met a stand-out intern who was anything but gracious, humble, and companionable.

What do the rockstar interns who exhibit these attributes get in return? At Nasdaq, we make sure the payback for interns includes exposure to a range of different areas within the organization, a shot at substantive responsibility with measurable impact, and access to senior management. Typically in a group setting, our interns get an opportunity to present to our leadership what they have learned over the summer. That’s not only the icing on the cake of the experience; it also teaches interns how to be poised and professional in front of senior executives.

But mostly, our internships, like all internships and first jobs, are good preparation for life. You get to see how the academic study and hard work that got you the internship opportunity translate to "the real world." You get to contribute to something bigger than yourself. In some cases, you get a career. Ask Oliver Albers, one of our rockstar interns, who embodied all four of the characteristics I described. Sixteen years ago, his summer job with us got him an offer for a full-time entry-level job; today, he is Head of Sales for Nasdaq’s Global Information Services.

More posts on this topic:

• “Here’s the Scoop: Why My First Job Mattered” — President Barack Obama
• “How Winning This Contest Changed My Life” — Oprah Winfrey
• “My First Job Lasted One Summer — But It Changed the Way I See the World” — Katie Couric, Yahoo Global News Anchor  
• “Dream Big But Be Humble: Lessons That Led Me from the Factory Floor to the Executive Floor” — Ralph de la Vega, Vice Chairman of AT&T, Inc.
• “Before I Became a Stylist, I Sold Shoes at the Mall. Here's What I Learned.” — Rachel Zoe, CEO, Rachel Zoe, Inc.; Editor-in-Chief, The Zoe Report
• “What Designing a Shampoo Bottle Taught Me About Business” — Meg Whitman, CEO at Hewlett Packard Enterprise
• “Just Starting Out: The Life-Shaping Potential of Our First Jobs” — Arianna Huffington, President and Editor-in-Chief at The Huffington Post Media Group
• “What I Lacked in Qualifications I Learned to Make Up with Courage” — Suze Orman, television host and motivational speaker
• “Practice Makes a Career” — Bernard Tyson, Chairman and CEO of Kaiser Permanente
• “What I Gained from Choosing the Rocky Road” — Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General of the United Nations
• “Everyone Should Have Access to That First Job” — Valerie Jarrett, Senior Advisor to President Obama
• “Remember Your First Job?” — Tom Perez, Secretary of Labor at U.S. Department of Labor
• “Employers: Young Workers Are Your Diamonds in the Rough” — Maria Contreras-Sweet, Administrator at US Small Business Administration