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Diary of a Summer Intern - Rio
August 30, 2012
“So when’s your last day again?”
I pause for a moment, hoping that by delaying the answer I also delay the inevitable truth that I’ve hoped would never come. The flurry of goodbye emails in my inbox from the other interns don’t hide the fact that at some point I have to do the same, too. Being an intern means that a semester of school and classes are waiting for me back in the United States. It will be exciting to be back at work at school, but I still need some time to context switch, if you know what I mean!
Rio with fellow interns Oscar (left) and Rodrigo (right)
There are so many things to look back upon this summer, and there’s no denying that the people I worked with make a large part of the powerful experience that comes with working at Google. Everyone at Google works to make things better for their users, even if it means staying up late to fix a bug or responding to an email. At the end of the day, though, I think what will remain with me the most is the feeling that I had of always being on the edge of my seat - every day I could come in to work with the knowledge that something awesome would get done by the end of the day - if not by me, then by someone else on my team or in the office. That fast cycle of high calibre innovation is extremely inspiring. And working at the scale of Google means being entrusted with a lot of responsibility, even as an intern!
One of the things that I’ve really appreciated as an intern working in Tokyo is that even with the time difference between here and Mountain View, working at Google makes that gap feel small. In fact, I’ve had the opportunity to connect with offices in Bangalore, New York, San Bruno, London (and with the other
Diary of A Summer Interns
Jess
in Pittsburgh and
Franklin
in Zurich!) all with the click of a button and
amazing video technology
. (It’s the same technology that allowed me, sitting in Tokyo, to
watch Google I/O
live from San Francisco). Just remember, though - it’s (
almost!
) really tough to schedule an office meeting with people from San Francisco, Zurich and Tokyo at the same time, because those time zones span a full 16 hours!
The past couple of weeks have been busy with rolling out other YouTube captions-related features and doing a lot of impact analysis, to make sure that the features do actually get used. After all, the best features are the ones that are the most useful, the ones that users say, “Yes, that’s exactly what I wanted!” One thing I’ve noticed is that it's easy to want to change the way a webpage or feature looks -- but
how
to introduce the new designs/features (so people react positively) is also really important.
Aside from work, I helped put together and present a feature on interns at the Tokyo office at our Friday social get-together, TGIF. It’s really neat to be able to see what the other interns in the office are working on. I also attended a
Mystery Lunch
, in which Googlers from around the office get randomly selected into groups to have lunch together. I also gave a lightning talk on some of my summer work, which is quite the challenge because you’re only allowed five minutes to present!
They say the best way to learn from the best is to be among them. I will miss the countless people who made me feel welcome, who encouraged me along the way, and who pushed me to tackle big problems. I can only hope that many more people try and apply for internships at Google, because we know there isn’t any shortage of big problems to solve!
皆さん、お疲れさまです！またいつか会いましょう！
Fun Google Fact:
Did you know there are at least 30 different internships roles at Google, and that this summer’s intern class included (at least one) Google Doodle intern and one industrial design intern? How cool is that?
Posted by Jessica Safir, University Programs
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