Company: ExxonMobil
Position: Upstream Controller’s Project Development Intern
What did you expect to gain from your internship?
During the course of the internship, I expected to have the opportunity to meet and network with a lot of great people and learn more about the company and the numerous sectors it is composed of. I also wanted to be challenged and to be able to learn something new on the job every day.
Did the internship meet or supersede your expectations? How?
The internship definitely met and superseded my expectations. The project that I worked on this summer gave me the chance to reach out to many diverse people within the company and challenged me in ways that I have not been challenged before within a classroom setting. The aspect that really exceeded my expectations was the company culture. Being treated as a full-time employee and working on a project to solve a problem that the company was currently facing, helped me become fully immersed in the collaborative, fun learning culture of the company.
Tell me about an interesting encounter you had during your internship.
During the internship, one of the best encounters I experienced was during the intern events. This is the first summer that ExxonMobil had a program that allowed interns across all sectors of the company to interact, network, and participate in intern events together. This gave me the chance to meet both undergraduate and master students outside of the business realm and allowed me to network with people who work in the field or in technical and engineering focused roles. It definitely helped me understand the large scope of the company and meet a lot of great students.
It is the people that truly make ExxonMobil a great place to work, and I cannot emphasize enough that the people I met were so diverse, knowledgeable, and caring during the entire course of my summer internship.
What did you learn about yourself that you did not know before?
One thing I learned about myself this summer was that I really enjoy solving large scope, abstract problems. I have always geared toward problems that are very defined and easy to understand; however, for my internship project, the problem I faced was very abstract and not neatly defined. I found the process of de-tangling the problem very interesting and met a lot of incredibly smart people along the way.
What did you contribute to the company?
I updated and improved the project management database that the regional and senior project controllers used within Development. By interviewing the people that maintain and use the database, I was able to increase the effectiveness and value of the process. This provided a better tool to analyze and understand the various projects that Development works on.
What advice do you have for other students who are recruiting for internships?
This internship definitely was an incredible experience. Even though it was a summer internship, there was not a moment when I felt that I was not one of the valued employees of the company. It gave me the chance to really see what type of work and daily routine a full-time hire would experience.