By Anil Kumar
For MBA students at India’s top business schools, while summer internship is a statutory requirement, this is also a high-stake gateway for full time roles. While for students without any work experience, internships give them a taste of what their future careers could look like, for those with prior work experience, it gives them an opportunity to get back to the corporate and learn new skills from the projects assigned to them during Internship. What separates students who secure PPO/PPI and those who sit in the campus placement? On an average only around 25% of the interns from India’s premier business schools successfully convert their internship to full time positions. It’s not just your technical skills, academic excellence, or prior work experience. The difference lies in understanding what companies truly evaluate during 8 – 12 week duration – and prepare for the same.
Internship to PPO – Why it matters?
Organizations having structured campus hiring program, summer internship to ppo model is pivotal to their overall campus strategy. Organizations intend to give best of the learning experience to the Interns hired from management Institutes and evaluate them for full time positions. Summer Internship gives them an opportunity to evaluate students over a longer period vis a vis few hours in campus recruitment process, turning out to be a relative superior assessment. Increase in overall campus hiring budgets by 15% coinciding with surge in PPO conversions by 24% in FY25 for MBA students to secure high-potential talent ahead of the curve, indicate renewed organizational confidence in structured internship programs (Ref.: Workforce Trends, Deloitte India, 2025,2024).
For students, as the stake are equally high, 2 months is a significant time to leave an impact to convert this opportunity to a full-time job. It provides certainty about company’s work culture and can result in better role alignment, before committing full time. For the students, without any prior work experience, it’s a platform of audition and firsthand taste of corporate life, and for those with prior work experience, it’s an opportunity for them to pivot themselves to new roles or deepen their expertise. While functional skills can make an Intern outdo othersin terms of best planning, forecasting, and execution strategy, there are unspoken skills evaluated by the organizations that reveal someone will thrive in culture or just complete the project. START before you start: The power of preparation
It is highly recommended that you do thorough research on the company, recent developments in the business, its competitive landscape, its values, leadership, and work culture. A lot of information is available in the public domain, what matters is what information one refers to and what is inferred from that. Getting prepared can certainly give you an edge and have meaningful conversation and position you as someone has come to contribute and not just to observe.
In case you know, there will be requirement of some technical skill sets to work on the projects, ensure that you are equipped with the skills beforehand, and not learn on the job.
There cannot be any guide better than an alum who has already done internship in the same organization, or an alum working in the same organization. Even if you can get 15 – 20 minutes of time from them, it can go a long way in helping you do better. Your alum can share recent examples and his/her learnings, hidden expectations, for you to deliver better results. If possible, main that connection during your internship, for real time guidance.
First impression: Day 1 as intern
Plan your commute to the office well in advance having buffer time. There is no harm to reaching early, as it is better than reaching late on your first day at work and reflects your professionalism. It’s safe to dress formal at workplace, unless dress code has been specified by the organization to you.
During Induction, you may get an opportunity to hear from and interact with Sr. Leaders in the organization. Ensure that you listen to them carefully and take notes. While taking notes can help you organize your thoughts, it reflects your eagerness and seriousness, and it also ensures that you don’t miss out on any key information being shared during induction. Though it may be convenient, but it’s best to avoid taking notes on your mobile phone as it may be perceived as you are engaged elsewhere.
Make best use of the opportunity to interact with leadership and demonstrate genuine curiosity and interest by asking relevant and well researched questions. Remember that they know about their organization a lot deeper than you, they don’t expect you to know everything about their organization and business around it, however they do expect the conversation to be intellectually driven. Connect with your fellow Interns, colleagues from business units/department other than the one you are going to do your internship.
Deliver impact – Have a POSITIVE ATTITUDE!
Take the task assigned, no matter how small, or big, with utmost seriousness. The assignment may look trivial in the beginning, however it’s always better if you first deliver that and then have conversation with the project guide. The task assigned to you may not actually be as simple as you may assume it to be and start showing disinterest. Complaining before proving yourself can be suicidal.
Your internship must lead to measurable value created for the organization, by aligning it to the business outcomes. Some Interns may work on market/financial research, analysis of the large datasets using statistical tools, drawing inferences, and making recommendations to the organization/clients. Others may be working on field intensive job, shadowing sales team, engaging with customers, retailers, dealers, distributors, investors, and/or customers, and navigating unfamiliar markets. Both have potential of immense learning and require different skillsets.
If you are thrown into an unknown territory, where you don’t know the language and dialect, your positive attitude and enthusiasm to learn will come handy here. You must approach language barriers faced while interacting with retailers, distributors, customers, local billboards, with enthusiasm. For interns sincere towards work with hunger for learning, there will be people to help you, irrespective of the barriers.
Seek FEEDBACK and ACT on it
Remember you may not be perfect in your first attempt. Don’t rush to submit work out of sheer excitement. Review repeatedly, and identify gaps, before submitting the final version. Your faculty guide allocated by the Institute can help you rethink your approach to solving a problem, challenge your assumptions, and suggest new variables and alternate frameworks, and help you avoid blind spots. However, onus of perfection would completely lie on you as an Intern. Guidance or feedback will emanate only from the questions you will ask, from your project guide, faculty guide, other colleagues in the organization, your alum, your peers, and how prepared you are for asking those questions.
Feedback also depends on how receptive you are, and whether you are working on the same. While seeking feedback is critical, it’s equally important to introspect at the end of the day. Have you stretched yourself an extra mile to do better every day during your internship. Are you able to visualize how your work connects organization’s strategic goals? Following key pointers can be helpful:
• Have clarity on expectations from project outcome upfront
• Share regular updates with your faculty and project guide at company
• Divide work into periodic deliverables and consistently take feedback and guidance on next steps • No compromise on ethics and Integrity with the data and results
• Build relationships with people around you
FOCUS – Self-discipline and time management
Don’t get involved in gossip, and discussions not related to work. Ability to work hard without much oversight and completing tasks before deadline are the qualities appreciated by business leaders. If you’re self-disciplined, you’re more likely to manage your time better, and complete tasks within deadlines. In a fast-paced corporate environment, 2 months will vanish instantly. Taking leave should be the last thing in your mind. Even if leave is granted, unnecessary absence doesn’t go very well with the leadership.
By the end of Internship, you must have a data backed compelling story. What problem did you solve? What value did you create and how does it resonate with organization strategic goals. And if they cannot relate to your story, your attempt to do so will certainly give you considerable learning to be used during the campus interviews and case competitions.
Embrace ambiguity and deliver certainty
While the net employment outlook (NEO) in India for Q1 2026(JFM) stands at 52% compared to global average 24%, global NEO is 4% less when compared with same time last year, implying lesser companies planning expansion across the globe. Rapid technological disruptions and their absorption by the organizations, and systemic geopolitical volatility are making changes in the preference of MBA graduates who understand its implications on business in larger context. Irrespective of the academic background, Interns must learn to connect the dots, speak both business and technology, and have potential to be a cross functional leader in uncertain business world undergoing digital transformation.
Students must also embrace high degree of tolerance and must be ready to take risks. With ~ 35% average PPO conversion across top 10 business schools in India, it presents an ever-exciting opportunity and a highly challenging landscape. In case the path to PPO feels daunting, remember Erik Weihenmayerr, the 1st blind person to climb Everest. With zero visibility and uncertain terrain, preparation and conviction will be your guide. Take your internship as preparation, make it Count.
Anil Kumar is Associate Director – Career Advancement Services at a reputed institution.
The author’s perspective are based on personal experience and publicly available information. It doesn’t reflect the official views, and/or policies of any institution or organization.
