Paid Internships Overseas, Paid Internship Abroad

By Lorraine Chow

Charles Roger Mbouti, 28, had nothing to lose when he decided to leave his home country of Cameroon and teach oversees. “I chose Thailand to live an alternative culture and face challenges that life offers,” wrote Mbouti via e-mail.

For two years, Mbouti has been teaching English conversation and French at Rajprachasamasai High School in Bangkok. When he’s not teaching, Mbouti professionally DJ’s on the weekends and gets as much out of Thailand as possible.

For those looking to find a job teaching English in Southeast Asian countries, you’re in luck–the demand for qualified teachers is high. Some schools in Thailand and Vietnam do not require their teachers to be TESOL/TEFL certified to teach English. While the salary might not be high, many programs will provide you with accommodations and plane tickets to and from the country. All you need to qualify is a bachelor’s degree and a working visa.

Laura Lizara, 28, also teaches English in Thailand. Originally from Canada, Lizara found her job through a placement program at www.ajarn.com. She also recommends finding a job once you’re there. “You can come here and call schools directly or go around dropping off resumes. There’s plenty of demand for English teachers,” she said. For countries with fewer English programs like Cambodia, Indonesia, Myanmar, etc, you can also talk to the expat community or to people in touristy areas for some leads. English newspapers might have ads for teaching or private tutoring.

Teaching and living in a different country can simultaneously be the toughest and most rewarding experiences in your life. Lizara notes the difficulties of being uprooted from home. “The hardest thing about living in Thailand is the hardest thing about living in any foreign country, which is just getting used to being in a different culture and trying to find your way around and do what you need to do in spite of not knowing the language.”

Despite day to day difficulties, Mbouti and Lizara embrace the all the benefits cross-cultural exchange. Both teachers plan to enjoy their Southeast Asian adventure and continue to teach:

“I am planning to use [my] experience gained to perform in another Asian country,” said Mbouti.

“I plan to stay for maybe two years and then go try another country… but who knows. My plans are always very flexible,” said Lizara.

Here are Web sites of placement programs in Southeast Asia:

Vietnam
http://www.teachabroad.com/Vietnam.cfm
www.lccoaching.com/vietnam.html
www.travel-to-teach.org/vietnam/vietnam_home.html

Thailand
http://www.ajarn.com/
www.masterses.com
http://www.eccthai.com/
http://www.mediakids-edu.com/

Philippines
http://www.missionteach.com
http://www.volunteerabroad.com/listingsp3.cfm/listing/14719
http://www.teflcourse.net/teaching-english-abroad/philippines/

Malaysia
www.lccoaching.com/malaysia.html
www.britishcouncil.org/malaysia
www.ih-malaysia.com
www.els.edu.my

Internships in the IT industry

Information Technology (IT) jobs are global – if you are working towards or already have a degree in Computer Science, your skills will be needed in almost every country on the planet.  Any international company will need good IT workers, but we will focus here on a few tech companies that have a variety of internships: Dell, Cisco, IBM, and Sun Microsystems.  These internships can lead to a job offer in the US, and if you want to work abroad, after a few years you may be able to transfer overseas.

Dell Computers offers summer-long internships to undergrad or grad-school (MBA) students in Austin, TX, Nashville, TN, Westchester, OH, Reno, NV, and Winston-Salem, NC, with possible postings in Latin America or Canada.  They have offices on every continent (except Antarctica, sadly), with a large concentration in Europe and Australia.  You can find a listing of their overseas jobs here.  The website gives a broad overview of their program, but also note that the hiring cycle is in the fall term, so get busy!  They hire interns in a wide variety of positions, such as Electrical/Computer Engineering, Industrial Engineering, Sales, Mechanical Engineering, Computer Science, Finance, Information Technology, Supply Chain, Logistics, and Operations.

Cisco is a leading IT company based out of Northern California.  They offer software, hardware, and Human Resources internships (as well as co-op jobs) in offices in California, Massachusetts, North Carolina, and Texas.  Though Cisco also has international internships, they do not offer work visas to work abroad (all the more reason to get started now with an internship here in the US).  The website is a good place to look if you are close to graduating as well, since they have a listing of job openings for recent graduates under the “graduate careers” section.  Cisco is an international company as well, with offices in South Africa, Egypt, Argentina, Columbia, Brazil, Australia, China, India, Cyprus, Denmark, the UK, France, Germany, and many more countries all over the world.

IBM, the “big daddy” of all of today’s computer companies, has a large listing of internships and coops in the US, which range from software development to finance.  Their website has a comprehensive listing of their internship offerings.  They offer internships in Engineering (Chemical, Industrial, and Computer), Computer Science, Computer Information Systems, Finance, Marketing, and Technical Writing.  They have internships in Atlanta, GA; Austin, TX; Boulder, CO; Burlington, VT; Dallas, TX; Endicott, NY; Poughkeepsie, NY; East Fishkill, NY; Research Triangle Park, NC; Rochester, MN; San Jose, CA; Westchester County, NY, Southbury, CT; Tucson, AZ; and many other cities across the U.S.  You can apply for an internship through their website, but you can also find when they will be coming to a campus near you for a career fair by clicking on the “campus calendar” button.  Fairs are a great way to learn more about a company as well as make a great impression on a recruiter.  It might be a great way to begin your path to working abroad in one of the 170 countries where IBM has offices.

Northern California-based Sun Microsystems is very intern-friendly, as they offer summer internships but also are open to keeping interns around during the school year as well (they have around 250 interns in the summer, 125-ish of whom continue to intern post-August).  They state they see hiring interns as hiring potential future employees, so this can be a great ‘in!’  Their website is full of information, with details about the extensive benefits of being an intern at Sun as well as links to specific job openings.  Most of their internships take place in San Jose, but they do have some internships in San Diego, Los Angeles, and Austin.  Sun operates out of more than 40 countries worldwide, including Israel, Saudi Arabia, Russia, the Czech Republic, Australia, and China.

Internships at these companies can be a great tool to working internationally.  If working abroad is a goal for you, look at your first couple years as your ‘try-out’ for the company, with the long-term goal of transferring to an international office.  An internship is the best way to begin this process, since you can start making a good impression while still in school.

Are you considered a good player in your sport while in college? Do people other than your mom tell you that you are the best and should be in the pros? Well, playing professional sports may be an option to work overseas.

Sports like volleyball, water polo, soccer, track, swimming, and basketball have professional teams around the world. Water polo, for instance, is the national sport in countries like Croatia. And these teams offer contracts to athletes in nationally-ranked college teams and members of the U.S. National Team. In many cases, your college coach can offer suggestions for your particular sport. If that doesn’t work, a good idea is to keep track of your statistics through your college years and also compile video on your playing ability. Then you can approach agents. This site has international agents in a number of sports.

You can  also coach sports overseas. Projects Abroad offers volunteer programs to coach in soccer, rugby, cricket, basketball, volleyball, track&field, badminton, tennis, and water sports around the world. For soccer, for instance, you can coach in Brazil, Costa Rica, Ghana, Moldova, Morocco and Senegal.

If you like to travel, then why not work in an industry centered around travelers and hospitality. The hospitality industry is a $3.5 trillion service sector throughout the world, and includes hotels, food service, casinos and tourism. If you are interested in a degree in tourism, check out this list at Wikipedia.

Of course, the best way to get involved in tourism is move to a city that attracts a lot of tourists. In the U.S. Las Vegas, San Francisco, New York, Miami, San Diego and Chicago are big draws for tourists passing through and also spending time in the surrounding area. These are also great starting points to work for some of the companies we talk about below who always have openings in other popular tourist cities such as Paris, London, Rome, Buenos Aires, Bangkok, Sydney, Istanbul, Cape Town, and others.

For such a huge and diverse industry, we will focus on the larger hotel chains Marriott International, Starwood, and Hilton.

Marriott International offers internships in Accounting/Finance, Catering, Culinary, Housekeeping, HR, Restaurants and Sales. Most of these internships take place at one of Marriott’s 3,000 properties in more than 100 countries. Although this page on Marriott’s College Recruiting is a bit limited in what they offer, take a look at the left column for a number of ways to work with the company straight out of college.

Starwood Hotels includes Sheraton, Westin,  and St. Regis in more than 95 countries. Starwood offers two internships. One is called an extern program in the fall. This takes place during the winter break and for two weeks students are immersed in the operation of a hotel department. This extern program is designed to give students project experience and also expand their professional network. Accommodations are included. The intern program takes place during the spring and summer. These are longer term and range in an area of interest, from sales to finance to restaurant that the student helps with and concludes with a final project.

Hilton Grand Vacations offers internships through it’s Grand Development Series designed for college students and graduates. These are classroom learning sessions to learn about the Vacation Ownership Industry and also include practical business skills on how to run a “time share”. These internships take place from Hawaii to Orlando, Florida. The site says to click on this page and search internships for available positions.

 Student Traveler also offers paid internship overseas articles.

Pharmaceutical companies do big business both in the U.S. and overseas. You can name a handful of popular drugs you see advertised every day on TV and in magazines: Viagra, Levitra… they are now common household names. The big business these drug companies do also costs them a lot of time and money to get the drug to market. According to Eli Lilly, the cost to discover and develop a new drug is $800 to $1 billion dollars, and it takes 10-15 years to get it to the patient.

So these companies love to spend money, and they have offices all around the world. So start a paid internship with these companies now, and soon they will have you pushing their drugs all over the world. We talk about the largest drug companies: Eli Lilly, Pfizer, Abbott Labs, St Jude Medical, Glaxo Smith Kline, Merck

Eli Lilly is based in Indianapolis, Indiana. While most of their 40,000 employees work here, over half work overseas. They have opportunities in Engineering, Finance, HR, IT, manufacturing, marketing, sales, and science/clinical. The college recruiting happens mainly on select campuses, and most internships are out of Indianapolis. But you can still search for positions.

Pfizer is the world’s largest research-based pharmaceutical company, according to their site. The company’s internships focus a lot on global research and manufacturing, so that’s a great starting point. Pfizer also has a nice web site, pfizerrdgrad.com, which lists the locations to take part in it’s internships: notably Sandwich, England for an overseas location.

Abbott Labs was named by the Princeton Review as one of the top three companies with a five-star rating for it’s internship. This page quickly shows you where Abbott Labs overseas offices are located, and then you can quickly go to a search page for internships in those different companies.  This internship page makes is easy to apply for one of 10 internships.

St Jude Medical offers two programs, an internship and a coop. The company says they do 40% of their business overseas, which can be seen here. According to the web site, an intern typically hired for a three-month, full-time assignment. Part-time internships may also be available, allowing students to work part-time all year or for a specific period of time while attending classes at their university. While a coop  is typically hired for a six-month, full-time assignment. Students generally take a full semester off from school for co-op assignments. Depending on the university, students may receive credit for their co-op work experience.

Glaxo Smith Kline is a UK-based company, so you know they have a bunch of overseas opportunities for their employees.  The site has a summer intern program for three months, a co-op program for six months, Procurement Development Program and IT Development Program.

Merck offers intern programs for 10-12 weeks during the summer. Most internships are in West Point, PA, Rahway, NJ, Whitehouse Stateion, NJ, Kirkland, WA, and Charlotte, NC. There are also opportunities in Puerto Rico. Another perk with the internship is the company offers nearby housing that are arranged and subsidized for interns.

Consulting companies help businesses get ahead by helping prioritize, organize and implement plans for future growth. They spend a lot of money in advertising (golfer Tiger Woods is in all the Accenture ads) and make a lot of money in return. The bigger consulting companies have offices all over the world. So try to get an internship with these companies now, and down the road you may be working all over the world to consult with all kinds of clients.

We write about these global consulting companies, that we have seen at a number of college career fairs: Accenture, McKinsey and Co, Booz Allen Hamilton, and Deloitte.

Accenture makes it easy to search for internships in one of the 140 countries it has offices in. The company offers internships for Computer Science, Engineering, Management Information Systems, Business, Math and Natural Science majors. For the 12 week internship, located in numerous different cities around the world, you must love technology and have previous technical, and programming aptitude and knowledge. Accenture looks for demonstrated leadership abilities, quantitative and analytical skills, along with an outstanding academic background. Most interviews take place on campus, but the site doesn’t list the campuses that Accenture will be recruiting at. So check back to Accenture’s college recruiting page in the fall.

McKinsey and Co has 90 offices in 51 countries, and internship programs from 4-12 weeks. Typically, the company will make an offer for a full time position after the internship is over. McKinsey has a three day look into consulting August 22-24 in Chicago, designed specifically for non-MBA students that are Black or Hispanic. All expenses are paid. You can find the information here to apply for the Discovery Weekend. Here is a link to the McKinsey and Co International Internship Program for a Business Analyst Intern.

Booz Allen Hamilton has offices on six continents, and over 21,000 employees.  Their site makes it easy to apply for internships in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France, Italy, The Netherlands, the Nordic region, Spain and the UK by going to this page on Booz Allen Hamilton’s International Internships. There are also internships in the Middle East. And if you have previous travel and/or study abroad experience, that helps you get a job in their overseas office, such as this international internship in Italy.

Deloitte has offices in 140 countries worldwide, and you can search by country here. Deloitte is a Swiss company, although their headquarters is in Manhattan.

Student Traveler magazine is the largest travel magazine for college students. Check out our paid internships section.

You’ve probably seen your local, Fed Ex or UPS driver scooting around town. Are those guys ever upset? It seems they love a job that keeps you on the road, lets you meet people all day long, and generally stay in great shape. That beats the cubicle doldrums for sure. And even if you get stuck with office duties, they may take you overseas like you see in Tom Hanks’ famous movie “Castaway” where he plays a Fed Ex supervisor who flies to Russia to oversee operations there. Okay, so the plane crashed on the way home and he is left on an island to wither away. But he did get to travel for some of the movie…

We write about four international transportation companies. You already know UPS. But we write about two you probably haven’t heard of — Expeditors and CH Robinson. Check out their internships below, and maybe you will be spend time for them overseas operating their deliveries rather than withering away in an office in the U.S.

UPS, famously known for the brown uniforms the drivers wear, is 100 years old and delivers 14.1 million packages and letters a day to 200 countries. Internship include marketing, industrial engineering, information services, human resources and communications. Start at UPSjobs.com and you can basically choose whichever country you want to apply for. Most jobs start as package handlers, but the site is quick to point out they these handlers move into more permanent positions as drivers or administration. Plus, UPS has an Earn & Learn Program that offers up to $15,000 towards college education to part time workers - not a bad incentive to push boxes around late at night.

CH Robinson is a third party, freight-forwarder. That means they handle the logistics to get people’s products all over the world. And even though you may have never heard of them, they have 217 offices around the world and over 7,000 employees. The web site has nice information about a day in the life as an intern.

Expeditors is another logistics company that helps products get from point a to point b. They have offices worldwide in accounting, account management, distribution services, sales & marketing, and a number of other areas you can find here. They recruit at colleges around the world, including community colleges.

Student Traveler offers information on paid internships overseas.

Working in the insurance field may be a great way to working your own hours, getting paid well, and seeing the world. The insurance field has long been regarded as one of the most resilient industries in tough industries. So why not work in the insurance field with a company that has international offices. The four below, AIG, Metlife, AXA Group and Prudential all have international offices where you can do your internship.

AIG has many career opportunities overseas. In fact, when you go to this career page, it asks you where you want to apply for a job overseas. AIG offers a summer, paid internship for juniors, seniors and graduate students called “the summer associate program”. To qualify, you need a 3.0 GPA in a major related to business, or a graduate student working towards a Master’s degree. Applications can be submitted in January, or visit an AIG recruiter on your campus starting in the fall.

MetLife offers numerous programs for students. The more popular are it’s “SBC Rookie Program” which is a 12-18 crash course of classroom and on the job training for sales. IT students with a GPA of 3.0, previous IT classes and/or internship can enroll in the IT Development program. MetLife also offers an “Actuarial Development Program” that trains students for executive-level internships and prepare for the actuarial exams”. Sales Internship, Investment Analysis Programs, and Legal Internship Programs are also available

AXA Group is the one of the largest insurance companies in the world, based in France. Their USA division is called AXA Assistance USA. They have two offices you can work from in Chicago or Miami. But they have offices all over the world. Their site is a bit confusing on how to find internship opportunities. It asks you to search for jobs but only comes up with 1 position for internships. The company recruits in colleges in the Chicago area.

Prudential Insurance offers nine internships in these US offices: Dresher, PA; Newark, NJ; Woodbridge, NJ; and Atlanta, GA according to their web site. Positions vary between Data Analyst, Process Management, Corporate Controllers, Law Clerk, Junior Programmer, Summer Associate, and Actuarial Summer Internship. But Prudential has offices in many other cities, so check with your local office for opportunities.

True. You probably aren’t happy with your friendly, neighborhood gas station right now due to gas prices. Most people can’t even afford to get an icee with that fillup. And prices don’t seem to be going down anytime soon.

So if you can’t beat the oil companies, why not join them? Oil and energy companies have offices and refineries around the world. At a recent, college career fair, two of the four people at the Chevron booth had traveled to multiple countries on the company’s dime.  This week we cover some of the largest oil producers in the world, Chevron, BP, and Royal Dutch Shell. See how you can get a paid internship with them overseas.

Chevron offers internships in these areas: Business Development -Land, Business Strategy, Earth Science, Engineering, Health and Safety, Finance, Government and Public Affairs, Human Resources, IT and Marketing. All of the internships except marketing are in the US. The marketing internship, called the 2008 Gateways International Internship Program, can take you to offices overseas. Now in it’s 5th year, the internship is a 10 week, global opportunity that immerses students in “building presence in markets around the world.” To be eligible, you need to be enrolled in an undergraduate program that has a GPA system, and be proficient in MS Office Suite.

BP offers graduate and intern opportunities around the world. There are 20 countries that you can apply for an internship right now, including Australia, New Zealand, the UK and Vietnam. You can even go to Pakistan if you really want to. You may have some issues figuring out how to intern in Norway, since the page is in Norweigan. The application deadline for most countries is in June so you will need to apply soon.

Royal Dutch Shell offers paid internships for college students and recent graduates.  The internships last from eight weeks to twelve months. According to their site, most of their internships will take place in the US if you are a citizen here. But in some cases they offer international internships for exceptional candidates.

Are you a whiz at math? Do you wake up every morning itching to read the business news? Do you understand the stock market and general investing? Then maybe the investment banking industry is for you.

Not only do investment bankers enjoy some of the highest payrolls in any industry, but many investment banks have offices in offices all over the world. Start with an internship with one of these global, investment companies, and soon enough you could be traveling the world on their dime. Most investment banks hire interns for the summer, and most of the internships are 8-10 weeks. The companies we discuss are JP Morgan, UBS, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers, and Merrill Lynch. Also, go to Student Traveler Magazine for information on paid internships and paid internships abroad.

JP Morgan has always made headlines as one of the premiere bankers in the world. Vault named JP Morgan one of the top 10 internships in the U.S., so you can imagine the competition is stiff. Those that get the summer internship are almost guaranteed a job with the company (96% according a recent issue of Businessweek) in either investment banking, sales&trading, research or asset management.

In order to apply for the internship, you must meet with them in person when they are on your campus. You can find their schedule of campus events here. You can send them your resume for an internship, but only if your school is NOT on this list.

JP Morgan’s web site says that a degree in business or economics is important, but not essential, for the internship. But it is important to like numbers and think analytically.

The application process begins in November and interns are chosen by February for the summer internship. JP Morgan also has full time positions for MBA graduates. The recruiting time period is about the same, but includes more interviews. Go here for JP Morgan’s MBA recruitment information.

UBS, a Swiss-based investment firm, has offices in over 50 countries around the world. UBS offers training in global wealth management/business banking, investment banking, and global asset management. Notice how two of those three areas had “global” in it. That means someone needs to visit all those international clients!

The application process is all on their web site that you can find job openings here. A search of internships in California found one internship available in global asset management in real estate for a summer MBA intern. The site asks you if you would like to be sponsored for an HB-1 work visa overseas. You should answer yes.

Deutsche Bank is a German-based investment bank with offices worldwide. They offer graduate and internship training for a systems analyst, investment banker or a trader. Deutsch Bank has two programs; the Analyst Internship program for sophomores and juniors and the Analyst Training program for graduating seniors. The internship offers industry exposure, mentoring, and networking with manager. The application process is easy by going here. They even ask you which country you want to intern in…

Goldman Sachs, whose previous CEO Paul Paulson is now the Secretary of Treasury for the U.S., offers summer internships called the summer analyst role for ten weeks in select locations. The summer associate role is for students working towards an MBA. Goldman Sach’s also stresses internships, sponsorships and scholarships from traditionally underrepresented groups. Once you apply, there are two rounds in the application. Round onw is a half hour interview on campus or at an office. This page is a good reference on how to approach your first interview. The second interview is more technical in nature, including basic knowledge of a particular area. For instance, if you are applying for a Securities division internship, they will ask where you think interest rates are heading or how the market has been performing. If you get past these questions, then the company invites you to join as an intern.

Lehman Brothers offers summer internships in many of their offices worldwide. These are full time roles that last 8-10 weeks. There are three different internships. The one as a Summer Analyst gives you experience within a specific business group at Lehman Brothers. These internships usually are the primary sounds for hiring full-time analysts. These summer analyst positions range in areas of investment banking, capital markets, investment management, corporate advisory, operations, finance, and information technology. The web site says to get in touch with a contact at your school for information on internships.

Merrill Lynch offers summer internships in nine different areas—Global Markets, Investment Banking, Global Wealth Management, Research, Operations, Technology, Chief Financial Office, Human Resources, and Compliance.  Interns are called summer analysts.  Their responsibilities vary by groups but are similar to those of recent graduate full-time hires in those groups.  For these roles, Merrill Lynch looks for exceptional student candidates who are in their junior year and are interested in a full-time position following graduation.  Students must have excellent academic records; possess solid leadership, team and communications skills; and demonstrate high interest in the financial services industry.  The best time to submit your application is from early September through December for programs taking place in the following summer.  Refer to ml.com/careers for specific responsibilities and qualifications for each group.