Interview Findings
Questions posed for students who have had a software engineering internship:
MITRE
Zipcar
Philips
- Have you seen The Internship (movie)?
- If yes, what was you opinion of the portrayal of tech internships?
- How was your internship setup? (avg group size, turnaround time, basis of company, how was your workspace set up etc)
- Did you enjoy your job? How does it compare with the atmosphere of Google campus?
MITRE
- No, has not seen movie.
- Department of 40-50 people without other interns. several teams (project based) can be on multiple projects at once. most projects lasted many years since govt funded.
- Everybody has own office. more regulated and less Google campus like. 5-10 people per project
- Yes. liked alot
Zipcar
- No, has not seen movie
- 7 man teams. every two weeks you put code into production. Release changes bi weekly
- All sides of web development using ruby. More fast paced than some other internships
- Open floor plan. Private off rooms to work in. Follows Google campus mentality on a smaller scale.
- Begins internship this us,,er
- No, has not seen movie
- Teams of 4-8, with each team in their own room
- 2 week task iterations so you are assigned a certain amount of work to complete in those two weeks.
- Multiple monitors and chairs in each work room so you can change setup often. Have long breaks and ping pong is a team favorite in terms of entertainment
- Loved job and the people she got to work with
- No, has not seen movie
- Worked with 4 other developers (mentor included). Team meeting each week, usually with CEO present, for free form discussions.
- Spent entire summer doing bug fixes in preparation for software overhaul
- Encouraged free form discussion throughout work day for problem solving and development
- Heavy emphasis on free schedule hours. Often would skip Thursdays and not begin work day until 10:30 everyday
- Enjoyed job very much
Philips
- No, has not seen movie
- 10 people team. Several teams can be on multiple projects at once. most projects lasted many years since govt funded.
- I enjoyed very much working at Philips. People were really nice. My managers took me out for dinners a couple of times. There are many difference between Google and Philips. Google campus has more young people and you can feel the energy from those youth. Philips is more like a traditional company where people have casual formal dress and talk in formal way and hierarchy exists.