Most MBA internships (as far as I understand) are project based. You come in and they hand you a project you can do in 12 weeks. It's expected that at the end you'll make a presentation to the groups you did the project for.
My project is working on career development. I'm helping to build out career ladders for various roles at LinkedIn. A career ladder defines what's next.
LinkedIn has been growing at such a fast clip, that it's been easy to focus on the growth of the company and new employees. Now they are getting to a point where they have to better define options across departments for promotion and growth.
The ladder for software engineers has been defined over the past few months, but now we need something more robust. I'm working first with IT to define some ladders for the job families they manage, and then I'll help hone the engineering ladder as well as help the operations department to build theirs out.
LinkedIn has been growing at such a fast clip, that it's been easy to focus on the growth of the company and new employees. Now they are getting to a point where they have to better define options across departments for promotion and growth.
The ladder for software engineers has been defined over the past few months, but now we need something more robust. I'm working first with IT to define some ladders for the job families they manage, and then I'll help hone the engineering ladder as well as help the operations department to build theirs out.
The career ladder is set up for individual contributors (IC). When people get hired into a position, it's easy to assume that as they get better and more experienced, they will move into management. The skills needed to be a great software developer are completely different than the skills needed to manage and coach employees. Likewise with strategic decision making needed in execs. This doesn't mean that if you're hired as an engineer you'll be a bad manager - it just means that different people need different opportunities to grow their career.
It's fun to get to talk to all of the managers about what they do and help them define some sort of structure for their employees. I'm also excited for the training aspect of the project - we have to make sure managers don't just get handed a tool they'll never use, but that they understand how to use it and have additional resources for when they need help.
Hopefully I can help set up an environment where managers have the tools and training to not only get great talent at LinkedIn, but keep great talent.
It's fun to get to talk to all of the managers about what they do and help them define some sort of structure for their employees. I'm also excited for the training aspect of the project - we have to make sure managers don't just get handed a tool they'll never use, but that they understand how to use it and have additional resources for when they need help.
Hopefully I can help set up an environment where managers have the tools and training to not only get great talent at LinkedIn, but keep great talent.
