Getting that coveted job is the ultimate dream come true for most students. However, the way you go about it is what makes you a cut above the others. You can either slog it out and wait for some good company to hopefully come your way during the recruitment period, or, you can take matters, and your destiny, into your own hands and grab that awesome internship programme abroad.

Here are 12 ways in which a foreign internship can change your future:

• The route to your future job: A greater number of companies, especially the ultimate dream ones such as Google, Facebook, Uber, Apple, etc, are dipping into their talented intern pool while hiring. Hence, if you really prove your worth during your internship stint, you may have already found your prospective future employer.

• Build your global network: An internship abroad will expose you to people and organizations internationally, allowing you to network with people whom you may not meet in your home country.

• Enhance your interpersonal skills: It is not just academic skills that you get to learn while interning abroad. Your internship stint abroad will broaden your perspective, introduce you to people from different cultures and backgrounds, and help you break down cultural barriers to achieve a common goal.  
• Carry your skills forward in your future career: As a fresher the skills that you learn – be it time management, interpersonal skills, problem solving, or learning to work as a team – while interning, will help you in your future career.

• Earn academic credits: Many of the internship programmes abroad help you earn additional credits, hence making them a great way of enhancing your academics, while getting to travel and experience a new culture. In addition, the skills and knowledge that you get from your internship can help you do better in your college.

• Learn adaptability: Be it picking up a new language, developing your social skills, coming to accept people who are from different racial backgrounds, and more – you learn how to deal with people and adapt in ways that may not be possible if you stay at home.

• Ace the interview: Taking up an international internship shows that you are a risk taker, and are willing to get out of your comfort zone and do what it needs to get what you want – a trait that interviewers and prospective employers would appreciate. 
• Expand subject knowledge: The way you are taught about a particular subject would be different from how you would be expected to approach it during your internship. This will allow you to broaden your subject knowledge beyond just book knowledge, and will teach you to apply it under different scenarios.

• Create a smashing resume: Everyone has a resume, but what will make yours stand out from the rest of the crowd are the experiences that you have. An internship stint abroad will do wonders to enhance your resume and tip the scales in your favour.

• Improve your language: Researchers from Penn State University have found out that picking up a new language alters the structure and functioning of the brain, thus strengthening it.  And, there is no better way to pick up and become proficient in a language than by practicing it in everyday life.  

• Discover yourself: This may sound spiritual, but it is highly practical. When you get out of your comfort zone, you will discover what you are good at, how you can manage difficult situations, and overall help you become a better person professionally and personally.

• Boost your confidence: You have been there, done that – what better way to boost your confidence. An internship stint abroad will help you tackle challenges, meet new people and learn to survive without much help, thus making it a great lesson in independence.   

About the author:

Aniket Singh works for Apple Inc. in California, United States. He is also the author of “Intern Abroad This Summer”. 

Aniket holds a BTech degree in Electrical Engineering from the IIT, Madras, Chennai, and a Master’s degree in Wireless Systems from Politecnico Di Torino in Torino, Italy. He has interned at the University of Southampton in the United Kingdom and Ecole Polytechnic Federale de Lausanne in Lausanne, Switzerland during this studies. 

Visit him at www.aniketsingh.com 

Check out his book at www.internabroadthissummer.com