Supercharge your team with Sustainability Interns

It is my firm belief that Today’s multigeneration workforce is THE game changer for Climate Action. I am more committed than ever to welcoming the bright interns with their optimistic mindsets into the Cisco workforce. There’s so much we can learn from them and frankly, the journey to a sustainable future hinges on their future leadership.?

This past summer, I was thrilled to have three interns directly on my team, and many more who worked across other functions also focused on Sustainability. After casting a very wide net and interviewing dozens of incredible candidates, I was honored to bring students onto the team who were majoring in Software Engineering and some Sustainability or Environmental focus from Stanford University, Brown University and Wellesley College. Dare I say that I believe our teams learned as much as I hope we taught them this past summer, and it gives me an opportunity to reflect and share their experiences as we plan for next summer and about how their experiences with my team -? Cisco’s Engineering Sustainability Office - shaped their thinking as they chart their future career path. Here are some of their reflections from the summer:?

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Denise: What was the most memorable aspect of your internship that surprised you the most??

Alana: By far the most memorable aspect of my internship was the opportunity to work with all of the incredible people within the Engineering Sustainability Office and their extended team. Everyone on the team welcomed us interns with open arms, and I truly felt supported and cared for, both personally and professionally. I was lucky enough to meet so many wonderful Cisconians, all who genuinely embody Cisco’s “Conscious Culture”, and I was so pleasantly surprised to see just how above and beyond everyone went to ensure that my internship experience went well. Whether it was volunteering with high schoolers from Junior Achievement to make solar lights, visiting the Meraki office in San Francisco, or going to get coffee together in Building 11, the team truly made this internship program exceptional not just in terms of education, but also in terms of experiences, exposure, and fun. There were so many opportunities for mentorship and growth, and I am so grateful for the support network that ESO provided?

Thea: The most memorable aspect of my internship?was the relationships I built with the people I had the privilege of working with on my projects,?in the Engineering?Sustainability Office and beyond. Despite being in different physical locations and stages in?our?careers, by the end of the summer, we had formed true and meaningful connections. I am so grateful for the time and effort they spent working with me, the trust they placed in me, and their eagerness to help and advise.?

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Denise: Continuing that on theme, what were your expectations going into internship and how did the experience compare??

Thea: My expectations going in were those of a typical internship at a large tech company: I'd get?a taste of a corporate?environment and?great experience completing small sustainability-related?tasks. My experience could not have been more different. The other interns and I were given the opportunity to drive incredibly impactful projects, work closely with senior-level people in the Engineering Sustainability Office and beyond,?sit in on executive briefings, and have real conversations about sustainability at Cisco with customers and partners. The?Engineering Sustainability Office was such a welcoming environment, and I truly felt like a member of the team?

Alana: Going into this internship, I wasn’t quite sure what the role of an intern within the ESO team would look like. I was hoping that this internship would be a good opportunity to explore real-world applications at the intersection of technology and sustainability, and I was excited to learn more about how ESO was driving sustainability efforts across Cisco’s portfolio. However, my time at ESO far, far exceeded these expectations! Not only did I learn so much about the work Cisco is doing to embed sustainability into the core of its business and solutions, but I was lucky enough to get to work on extremely impactful projects and interact firsthand with revolutionary?sustainability technology. It was also really rewarding to see so many huge milestones for ESO come to fruition throughout the summer (BIG shoutout to my fellow intern Thea who helped drive the addition of a Sustainability Simulator to the sales console!). I felt like even as an undergraduate intern, I was given endless opportunities to take on big responsibilities and have significant influence in the process. It was especially meaningful to work with a team of people so passionate about sustainability and the future of our planet, not just setting sustainability goals but also following through successfully.?

Denise: That’s a great segway to the next question. What did you learn from your interactions from the different generations you worked with (e.g. Boomer generation, Gen X,? vs. Gen Z)??

Alana: While at Cisco, I was fortunate to have the opportunity to interact with a wide range of people, from the Boomer generation to Gen Z. As a senior in college preparing to enter the workforce, it was invaluable to hear about the career and life experiences of those around me. I was able to talk with adults who had been at Cisco for 20+ years, and new grads who had joined Cisco just in the past year. Hearing their stories, from why they chose to work in IT to why they chose Cisco specifically, was an incredible learning opportunity, especially as I was able to engage with employees across many different teams and business units. I also learned a lot about interacting with different kinds of people, and the importance of building relationships with those around you. In all these interactions, it was very exciting to see how many generations within Cisco were coming together in the fight against climate change, especially since I think it’s an issue where we all have a huge role to play.?

Thea: Working with people across generations was one of the most?valuable aspects of my experience this summer. I learned so much from time spent with my fellow interns in and out of the office. We brought together knowledge from classes taken and other internship?experiences. I gained the most through exposure to professionals?that have been driving sustainability at Cisco and beyond for many years. From them I learned how to navigate the fine lines that characterize sustainability work in a corporate?environment. I left at the end of the summer with so many role models, from interns to senior-level people with long careers behind them.?

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Denise: That is so inspiring to hear about your summer through your eyes, it almost makes me want to go back to college so I could apply for internships again. To conclude, in one sentence, how would you describe your summer at Cisco??

Thea: A summer of incredible experiences that enabled me to concretely?impact sustainability efforts at Cisco and connect with passionate, like-minded people that have dedicated their careers to sustainability.?

Alana: My summer at Cisco was most definitely “the best internship in the country” and beyond surpassed all of my expectations, as I grew both personally and professionally through the incredible mentorship and team culture at ESO, the impactful sustainability work, and the unique experiences I had while working and living in the Bay Area.?

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THANK YOU Thea and Alana.?

After this conversation, I am convinced more than ever that tapping into the newest generation to join the workforce has tremendous benefits to offer. Not only do the leaders of the generations before them – from the Baby Boomers, Gen Z to the Millennial Generation – learn so much from this cohort, but investing in a savvy strategy to bring in more Gen Z has a lot of pluses from managing budget pressures to ensuring diversity through the lens of a multi-generational workforce.?

My takeaway is what is at stake here if we do not invest in a robust internship program. Simply put, there is so much to be learned from one another. Learning is growth. Accelerating that growth – personal, business or otherwise – can be as simple as the multi-generational workforce working together side-by-side. And that ... is diversity at its best.?

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