Adena writes:
I am a recent college graduate hoping to pursue a career as a journalist (feature writer). Currently, I am a marketing intern at a respected, award-winning regional theatre company. In college I majored in theatre, although I also minored in journalism, wrote for the school paper and interned with two renowned journalists.
I have sent out resumes to a few newspapers for reporter positions and recently received an offer to work in a primarily administrative position as an editorial assistant (this is not the position I applied for, but it is the one that has been offered to me.) Time permitting, I might also be allowed to write feature stories on occasion.
I am unhappy with my internship — mostly because I am no longer interested in marketing — and want a job in journalism. However, they need me as an intern at the theatre company, and would be very angry at me if I chose to leave. My internship officially ends July 2010.
What do you think I should do?
The Career Doctor responds:
You don’t need to hear this, but I do wonder why you took the internship in the first place if theatre was not something you were going to pursue as a career.
I think before you decide anything, you have some big questions to ask yourself — and answer.
First, what is it you really want to do for a career? It sounds like writing, so perhaps you have answered this question, but humor me and ask it again.
Second, where do you want to live? I think it’s kind of odd that you would take an internship on the West Coast while now searching for jobs on the East Coast.
Third, why are you not using your network? Take the time to consult with your journalism professors and the journalists in your network. Get their advice — and perhaps get more names of editors you can contact about jobs.
Typically, I tell job-seekers to never burn bridges because you just never know who you will see again in your job search. That said, if you can answer all the above questions and want to pursue this editorial assistant job (or some better one that comes from your network), then you should do so… but be professional with the theatre company and give them as much notice as possible.
If you do take the editorial assistant job and you have not had anything published after six months, you will need to start looking again for another job. In all my past experiences, editorial assistants were basically go-fers.
