How to Survive Your Internship: 8 Schedule Tips

By Lev Novak

Let’s get this out of the way right now: I’m not going to teach you how to make an impression on your boss, or how to network your way into employment or any other business concern. That’s for another day. But today is monday, and the point of Monday has been the same throughout history.

The point of Monday is to survive. And to survive, you need to schedule.

You only have so many websites to distract yourself with, and only so many trips to get water without arousing suspicion. So what do you do? Set up a schedule to distract yourself from your boredom.

1. Second Breakfast

The first thing you’re going to want to do is have a second breakfast. I don’t care if you had one at work- have another one. Oatmeal, a muffin, and coffee. Spend the first twenty minutes setting up your workspace and then snack, browsing your work email. This last part is very important- you have to be doing something mildly relevant to pull this off, and the best part is you’re going to look extra productive. “Look at her” they’ll think. “She’s working through breakfast!” That will distract them from realizing, wait, she’s just slowly eating a muffin. But you’ve escaped. That’s an hour gone.

2. Email For More Work

Write emails. Lots of small, professional ones. Send them throughout the day like little baby pigeons. Ask people for more work in a vague, positive way. This means you’ll get the credit for volunteering, but also will have an escape clause from anything really annoying.

Most of the time you won’t get any extra work, but occasionally someone will have a project or a meeting. Go to these. It’s probably good to get face-time or whatever, but c’mon: it’s something to do, plus there might be free food. If you’re really lucky you can snag a sandwich while pretending to take notes about toner-levels.

3. Always Go Out For Lunch

Don’t eat out, necessarily: while that’s fun, it can eat into your wallet. But even if you brought a sandwich you should leave the office around lunch. Get some air. Go to the park. Get frozen yogurt. Do anything but sit on your computer looking at websites slack-jawed. Then, after your break from the monotony of the office, you can eat your real lunch at your desk instead. You’ll look hard-working, and it’s more time down.

4. Bathroom/Coffee Breaks

The beautiful couple, as one leads directly into the other. Always take the long route and say hi to all your intern friends. Drink, chill, talk, and then bathroom it up. Any time you’re dying, either of these is an excuse to get up and move.

5. Do Work

In case of extreme boredom, do some work. But not real work: do creative, tangentially related work. You’re an intern: if you were meant to work, they’d pay you for it. Instead, do some stuff you like that sort–of involves the company. Draw product specs if you like to draw. Come up with a fake ad campaign if you saw Mad Men. Think big, and don’t do busy work. Do research no one asked for, or come up with ideas that don’t go anywhere. Keep these word documents around because if someone asks what you’re working on, bam– easy excuse or way to impress someone. Worst case scenario, you’re day-dreaming on paper.

6. Semi-Productive Sites

No one can be mad if you’re on The New York Times. Same with uCribs. Two great sites, both work-boredom staples.

7. Stay Late

The tricky gamble is to stay late sometimes. Say you have a little extra work to do, and skip the rush-hour traffic. Just play your favorite game online, or, if you’re especially bold, watch T.V. It’s a gamble, but if no one notices, you’re going to get a lot of credit as a guy who stays late. That means, in a boredom emergency, you can leave early without getting any weird looks.

8. Go To Sleep

The more sleep you get the night before, the more energy you’ll have for the next day, and the less boring and terrible work will seem. Getting decent sleep is a drastic move, but it can work, too.

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