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Student-Internship-2
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Student-Internship-1

Internship Opportunities

The Department of Business Administration Internship Program offers students professional hands-on experience working with businesses and companies while earning academic credits.

Business Administration graduates have worked with companies such as: 

  • Fastenal 
  • Merchants National Bank 
  • IBM
  • Northwestern Mutual Financial 
  • Mayo Clinic 
  • Target 
  • Menards
  • Area Non-Profit Companies

Internship Program Information

The Internship Program awards academic credit for professional, on-the-job experience in a business or company.

Many companies have well established internships. In some, internships are unique and negotiated between the student, the employer, and the faculty advisor.

A professional work experience is required, and many times compensation is paid to the intern to assure seriousness of effort and commitment on both sides.

Please note the following Internship prerequisites effective Spring 2017:

  • For all majors: Admission to the College of Business and 2.0 GPA
  • BUSA majors: MGMT 325 and three required and/or elective courses in the major at 300+ level
  • HR majors: MGMT 325, MGMT 317 plus two additional required and/or elective HRM courses at 300+ level
  • MIS majors: CS 234 or MIS 312, MGMT 325, MGMT 334, MIS 362
  • BUSA majors: MGMT 325 and three required and/or elective courses in the major at 300+ level
  • HR majors: MGMT 325, MGMT 317 plus two additional required and/or elective HRM courses at 300+ level
  • MIS majors: MGMT 325, MGMT 334, MIS 362, CS 234

Provides an opportunity for students to apply knowledge, skills, and concepts they have studied in their academic work.

Provides potential employers an opportunity to preview WSU business students with no obligation for continuing full-time employment. 

Provides students with practical experience and added credentials, useful when entering the full-time job market. 

Builds closer relationships between WSU and the business community; enhances the image of WSU, the Department of Business Administration, and our business students.

Begin looking for a suitable internship at least one semester prior to registering for the internship. Seek a suitable faculty advisor to serve as your instructor.

*Hint: Watch the bulletin boards for opportunities.
Career Services maintains a database of openings and organizations with interest in student interns. Use your personal contacts through friends, family, former employers, etc. Some companies contact faculty with internship opportunities. Negotiate a job description and hourly pay with the company representative. You must identify a supervisor to whom you report at the company and with whom your faculty advisor may be in contact. With your faculty advisor, fill out the necessary WSU forms and attach to the proposal form in this packet. Submit these forms to the Department Chair for approval. Determine, with your faculty advisor, what the content and structure of your weekly reports and final research paper will be. Register for the internship, observing the deadlines in the academic calendar in the current WSU Class Schedule.

Note: BUSA 399 is 3 credits, grade only and is applied to Business Electives. This course is required for each internship. BUSA 398 may be taken for 1 to 9 credits. It is P/NC only and applies only to General Electives. When taking BUSA 398 you must have concurrent enrollment in BUSA 399. If you choose to take 12 total credits for your internship, 400 hours on-site work is required. 200 hours are required as a minimum for 3 to 6 credits. Internships are 15 weeks maximum


Evaluation of Your Internship Experience

The grade you earn on your internship will be based on the following:

  1. The Internship Proposal and Contract form details the job for which the internship is taken. This is the form the employer completes and signs which you submit to your faculty internship advisor to initially gain approval for the internship and register for it. (See Internship Proposal and Contract Form).

  2. Prepare weekly reports summarizing your work (based on daily log) to your faculty internship advisor. Content of these reports is to be negotiated with your faculty internship advisor. Use suggestions for daily log given in this Internship packet. These reports should indicate progress in each of the objectives identified in the internship proposal and contract.

  3. Near the midterm of your internship, your on-site supervisor will be asked to submit an evaluation of your work. See the form included in this packet.

  4. At the end of your internship, your on-site supervisor will be asked to submit another Evaluation Form to your faculty internship advisor.

  5. Prepare and submit a final research paper (as initially agreed on by the student and faculty advisor) to your faculty advisor. This is not to be simply a summary of your daily logs. See Content Suggestions for Final Research Paper in this packet.

The Company

What is the purpose of your business? What has made it successful? What do you particularly like about your company?

Go into detail about your company's product. If your product is a service explain that.
Comment on the long-run need for your product or service.

What technological changes are imminent in your business, if any? What technological changes may be forthcoming over the next 15 years?

What are the names of the trade papers in your industry? Get one; list the articles in that particular issue. What sort of articles do you find the most interesting and helpful?

Functional Analysis

Which functions are the most important to the success of the business: Marketing, Central Administration, Production, Finance, Research and Development, etc? Are these functions in good condition to handle the future growth and/or problems of the organization? What suggestions would you make?

How well is the company planning ahead? Does it have budgets for the next year; for the next five years?

Is the company doing anything to prepare for an eventual transition in top management? How does it attract its top manager -- pay, geographic location, potential personal growth? Is there competition for jobs at the top? Is there a management training program?

What are the fringe benefits for an employee in your business? Is your firm a leader, follower, or average industry wide? (You might need to write other companies in the industry to survey their fringes.)

Did the form of organization (Corporation, Partnership, or Proprietorship) have any effect on its operation? Would you suggest a different form than the one the company is presently using? Why? (Examples: taxes, control, liability, sources of funds, etc.)

Is the company in good financial condition? Is it prepared financially for the future? Is it using modern investment analysis techniques to approve/disapprove project, manage cash and accounts receivable, make investments, value its assets, etc? What suggestions would you make?

Competitive Position


What is a main weakness of the business? What would you suggest should be done to correct it? What is its strength? Is it capitalizing on it?

What is the company's competition? How strong is the competition? What is the company posture -- to maintain its position, to grow or to shrink? Does the company have an organized strategy concerning competitive strategies planned for next year, the next five years, etc.? What suggestions do you have?

What is the place of your firm in the industry?

Organization, Leadership and Operations


Construct or update an organization chart. Any suggestion for reorganization?

Observe and comment on the informal organization.
Evaluate leadership of superior, i.e., autocratic vs. democratic. (From observed actions)

Describe and evaluate the communications network, including the informal one.
Study paperwork, and how some of it might be eliminated or why it is necessary. Show how the forms flow from one station to the next, and how the flow may be improved.

Study the possibilities of a unit-wide data base.
Comment on different approaches that may be needed with different clients or individuals: a. if in sales, could refer to different techniques; b. in administration, how to deal with different personality types.

Comment on success of a particular advertising campaign or new technique. Does not necessarily have to be anything new, just successful in your business.

If any new ideas or revisions are implemented, watch how people resist the change. How is this resistance overcome? Or is the new technique or idea modified and altered by the resistance? In what ways?
If your work is in sales, formulate an analysis of different types of customers and what kind of an approach works well with each.

Analyze mistakes -- yours or others. What were they? What did you learn from them?

Your Internship -- Personal View


As an intern, how were you used in the firm? Were you given many responsibilities? What do you think could be improved in your education process on the internship?

Comment on areas of personal development in the internship.

Has your internship affected your future plan?

What courses in your college career have proved most helpful?