With the beginning of new year, every startup’s open mailing list starts receiving emails from graduate students for summer internship. I have read hundreds of applications that follow a generic template, somewhat like this:
Dear Sir/Ma’am,
My name is <name> and I am currently pursuing my <degree> in <major> from <institute>. I am well-versed with C/C++ and have started learning Java. I’m also learning about Android and iOS apps. I have good knowledge of HTML, CSS, JS too.
If given chance, I’ll give my 100% at work. I am confident that I will be a valuable asset to your team.
Please find the attachment of my CV
Kind regards,
<Name>
Seems like a decent email, however, there’s one major red flag about this application. The applicant is not talking anything about the startup he is applying to and how he will benefit them. This shows that the applicant has not researched about the company’s business and engineering. So, how to write an application email for Software Engineering Internships at startups?
Sure that’s going to make your application a little longer than usual, however, it will make you stand out among the crowd. Ideally, such an application should be addressed to one of the engineers at the company.
Terms like “I’ll be a good addition to the team”, “Fast learner” etc. are subjective in nature. You have to prove it objectively. This is why many companies have started giving away take-home projects. Candidates can work on it for a week and depending on the work accomplished, companies get a good idea of how the candidate will perform during the internship. Some companies think that the candidate can cheat by asking someone else to do the take-home project. So they keep the candidate for a week-long project on trial. To overcome all of this, you, as a candidate, can think of features or apps that you can build which could be of value to the company. You can also make use of any APIs exposed by the company. You can then highlight such contributions to the company in your application, which shows that you’re reliable because you have a good past record.
LinkedIn and AngelList are extensively used by Talent Acquisition team because they are quite familiar with their profile format and features. A Github account with few repositories and regular commits helps you in two ways: It shows that 1. You know how to use git 2. You’re consistent at work. Engineers may check your code to judge you by its quality.
You may also create a portfolio for yourself. You can extensively highlight all your projects in the portfolio. You can also write tech blog posts about challenges you faced during some project and how you solved them. By thy way, if you’re good at communication (written or verbal) you will do well in any job in the world. And your application email is one of the things by which every company is going to judge your communication skills.
Lastly, prepare a short résumé that highlights your strengths and modify it for the target company. The resume format suggested by careercup seems adequate. However, it is suggested to apply your creativity to make it stand out. People don’t spend more than 30 seconds to go through any resume. Make sure you make those 30 seconds count.
The startup hiring process includes resume filtering, phone screening, face-to-face interviews (plus take-home projects in some cases) and final interview with founders. Many good candidates are not able to get past the first hurdle. To all those candidates, next time you apply for an internship, use this post as a checklist. All the best!
Till next time. Evíva!
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