Phoenix Ad Blog

This open letter was submitted by Jenavi Kasper, who recently resigned as an intern at one of the large local ad agencies: Dear Local Advertising Agency Named After the Founders, Well, it’s been one heck of a time interning over at your super-cool office. The Friday in-house happy hour was a great touch. When I landed the internship at your place I was excited. Working downtown in a hip office, getting some experience in the industry and the free beer is what lured me in. It sounded like a dream! And I have to say, when I told people where I was interning they were pretty impressed. But you guys dropped the ball (figuratively of course). Come to think of it, while I was there I never did see anyone start the pick-up game of basketball I was expecting to break out at any moment--but maybe I was tainted by the YouTube video. (What good is the basketball hoop in the office if nobody uses it?) I would be crazy to leave, right? Even if it was an unpaid internship it’s still a resumè builder. But, if you can believe it, I left this experience disappointed. Maybe that’s my fault. I had unrealistic expectations. I thought that interning would allow me to use my brain and maybe, just maybe, apply some of what I spent four years learning. But you proved me wrong. You have snatched my naiveté like a pillowcase filled with candy on Halloween. The funny thing is, I didn’t get it right away. When you assigned me to organize the pens by color on my first day I didn’t worry much about it. When you asked me to drop off DVDs to your client’s office, I didn’t think twice (though I wasn’t paid for gas). I didn’t even mind when you asked me to help you move binders out of your office. But it started to get old fast. When “helping with projections” meant reading you numbers off a spreadsheet I became a little discouraged. When “working with scripts” meant retyping scripts I was bummed. It was especially painful when I spent all morning cleaning out an office for the new girl while you guys took off to Starbucks. It wasn’t all bad. You did let me go to that commercial shoot, which was fun, and it was great to be able to sit in on a couple of meetings. But there are some things you should keep in mind before you bring in my replacement: Remember, we are ADVERTISING students. That stuff you do for your clients to get the word out, the get the brand promise out to the target audience, we know how to do that too. We also know those Jedi mind tricks. We want to learn as much about the business as possible and if you can’t provide that training we will find someplace else that will. That place might be your competition. Or heck, we’ll freelance and become your competition. So be careful. You don’t want to end up being called out on a blog, do you? Yours Truly, The Intern If you're looking for someone capable of something a bit more subtle than sorting pens, you can reach Jenavi on Facebook and Twitter, or by e-mail at jenavikasper@yahoo.com.