About the author: My name is Helen Tang. I’m a fourth year computer engineering student at the University of Waterloo. I was a Software Engineering Intern on the Frontend Infrastructure team at NerdWallet from January to May, 2020.

January, 2020. I was excited. I felt the adrenaline rush as I packed up my bags for my flight to San Francisco. A new city. A new adventure. Fast forward to March, 2020. I was anxious. I felt the adrenaline rush as I packed up my bags for my flight back to Toronto. As a result of COVID-19, the last two months of my four-month long internship at NerdWallet became remote. I learned countless lessons during this period of time, and here are 3 tips to succeeding in a remote internship.

1. Communication is Key 🔑

It is more important now than ever to learn how to use your communication skills — whether it’s staying in touch with your team through slack messages, conveying your engineering ideas via Zoom calls, or writing up a professional email. Some aspects of communication I focused on are:

• Updating the team on what I plan to do throughout the day, and what I accomplished the day prior

• Explaining my thought process regarding engineering decisions I made through verbal and written means

• Being concise, and highlighting key points in my messages

2. Organize Your Time 🗓 + Work Space 🖥

A few weeks in, I had established a routine where I would write down all the tasks I want to accomplish that day. Choose a medium that works for you. I found that writing with a pen on paper, and being able to cross items on my list provided me with the greatest sense of satisfaction. In terms of organizing your time, keep these items in mind:

• While tracking your daily goals, don’t lose sight of your medium and long term goals (ex. what do I want to accomplish during this internship?)

• If there’s something I wished to discuss, I would write a brief outline of the topics, and points I had regarding each topic. This helped me determine whether I should set up a meeting, or rather send a slack message/email instead

• Don’t worry if you can’t complete everything on your to-do list for the day! It happens to everyone. Learn to be flexible, and plan your next day accordingly. With several iterations, it’ll be easier to figure out the amount of workload you should take on in a given day.

Organizing your work space is especially important when you’re working from home. This space should be relatively clean, organized, and noise-free. I found a room in the house to work in. Whenever I step into this room, I feel ready to be productive. Whenever I want a break, I step out of this room.

3. Take Care of Your Mental Health 👩‍⚕

Learn to take effective breaks. Stay physically active. Eat well. These seemed obvious to me at first, until I realized that it was difficult to complete all these things while balancing everything else going on in life. Here are some of my biggest takeaways:

• After taking an effective break, I was completely energized and ready to power through the next task on my to-do list. This took a bit of time to figure out, but I realized that the length of the break doesn’t correlate with its effectiveness. The most effective breaks were ones where I didn’t constantly think about the tasks I was working on before the break, or tasks I plan to do after the break. Once I discovered this, I was able to work more productively after the break.

• Exercising to stay physically active is all about consistency. I used to go through periods of exercising rigorously for a few weeks, and then being so burned out that I stopped exercising for a few months. I learned to slowly build up the level of intensity and frequency of your physical activity so that it becomes part of your lifestyle.

Overall, my internship at NerdWallet has been incredible! From the amazing University Recruiting team who have worked hours on end to organize events for the Nerdlings (even after we became remote), to the remarkable mentorship program, my experience at NerdWallet has been the embodiment of ‘work hard, play hard’. I would definitely recommend everyone to apply for the Nerdling program. Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions!