Photo Credit: scui3asteveo

This is a guest post by Christie Ingram

What do you think of when you think of the word "intern"? College students trying to get credit? A medical student? The true definition of intern is "a student or trainee who works, sometimes without pay, at a trade or occupation in order to gain work experience." Interning is the perfect way for you to try out a "job", to make sure it is a good fit for you before you jump in with both feet.

I have been interning for the past several weeks for Kelly McCausey at the WAHM Talk Radio Blog and Podcast and it has been a very positive experience for me and my future. Kelly sent out a Tweet looking for interns and I quickly responded. I wasn’t even sure what I was responding to (and a little panicked as we have a baby on the way, and not sure I would have enough time to devote to the project). I just knew that interning for Kelly would be a fabulous learning opportunity, to learn more about blogging, podcasting and the WAHM community and if it was meant to be, it would work out.

Kelly emailed me back and explained it was a 10 week commitment – and phew!, I had about 10 weeks until the baby would be full-term! I was excited to see what this interning thing was all about. Of course, every interning experience will be different, but Kelly has 5 interns on the go right now and we have a meeting every week and we get a task sheet for the week, which is so helpful.

Learning something new is always a big task for me, I love to research everything to death, which ends up taking far more time that if I just did it. Interning has provided me the knowledge and the guidance I need without having to spend MONTHS researching anything. I also get reassurance I am doing things the proper way. If you are like me and can suffer from analysis paralysis, and internship is a great way to get going!

I have learned so much about blogging and WordPress and especially the work at home mom community that would have taken me months or years to learn on my own. And I am still learning every day! We are really being exposed to the different communities we are interning for, making connections and understanding the market.

If you are thinking about entering a new market or switching focuses or a whole new career change, I really recommend you intern for a few weeks. Dipping your feet into that arena will give you a great sense if you want to dive in head first. If you don’t see anyone offering internships, ask around, maybe someone will take you up on your offer. Be serious about your commitment and you can learn so much in a relatively short amount of time.

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Christie Ingram is the blog and podcast intern at Work At Home Moms Talk Radio. Very soon to be a mom herself, Christie in passionate about the WAHM community and is really enjoying all she is learning as an intern.