Each summer, students from the University of Delaware’s Alfred Lerner College of Business and Economics gain valuable professional-level exposure through internships. This year, young scholars were able to traverse the complications of the COVID-19 pandemic by pursuing an array of internships, externships and other professional development opportunities. Each profile of this series will detail a Lerner student’s experiences working on business-oriented projects.
Carter Viets, Class of 2023 economics and marketing double major with Spanish and legal studies minors, spent his summer as a marketing intern at Mercury Financial.
Lerner: How did you find out about this internship? Why did you choose it?
Viets: Through alumni network of Alpha Kappa Psi (professional business fraternity on campus).
Lerner: Did the coronavirus pandemic impact your internship search and working experience? If so, how?
Viets: Yes, not many workers were in the office so when I went in I was very isolated. A lot of the meetings and projects happened virtually and there wasn’t much interaction with anyone.
Lerner: What did you learn from this internship that you think you would not have learned elsewhere?
Viets: I learned about analyzing data and was introduced to corporate culture and jargon. I also was able to narrow down my interests in a different direction based on what I didn’t like in terms of the content of the internship.
Lerner: What was the most exciting task or project that you did in your role?
Viets: I generated a weekly Payment Report, where I analyzed and interpreted data from Tableau and SQL. This Payment Report was sent out and used by the entire Marketing and User Experience teams to change their strategies for the week.
Lerner: What is an example of a time where you were able to apply what you’ve learned at Lerner to your role?
Viets: I definitely used the skills I learned in MISY261 when learning about Tableau and Excel in more depth. Having a basic understanding of Tableau from my class allowed me to cut down on the time I needed having to learn the program.
Lerner: How do you think this internship will aid you with your professional goals?
Viets: I think this internship will allow me to get my foot in the door in bigger companies and hopefully get another internship in a field that sparks a little more interest in terms of what I want to do later in life.
Lerner: What are your plans or next steps in your career now that your internship is over?
Viets: I now am switching things up and am a paralegal at a law firm to narrow down my interests and hopefully intersect my interests in business and law. I plan to intern at a corporate company next summer and am looking for internships.