Bill Pikounis is head of manufacturing and applied statistics at Janssen R&D, the pharmaceutical division of Johnson & Johnson. He oversees worldwide statistical services and products to serve areas of manufacturing of biotech (biologic, large), molecule, vaccine, and small molecule (pill, tablet) products. Pikounis has served as president of the Princeton-Trenton Chapter and Philadelphia Chapter and is an ASA Fellow.
Elizabeth Mannshardt is the associate director of the US Environmental Protection Agency’s Information Access and Analytic Services Division and an adjunct associate professor in the department of statistics at North Carolina State University. Mannshardt earned her PhD from The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She is vice chair of the ASA’s Committee on Career Development and also serves on the organizing committee for the North Carolina Chapter of Women in Machine Learning and Data Science.
Should a person who satisfies most, but not all, of the listed qualifications apply for an internship?
Mannshardt: Absolutely. The list of qualifications listed on any job announcement is generally a ‘wish list’ for the employer. While there may be a couple of must haves, hiring managers are not necessarily looking for someone with every single qualification and, at the résumé review stage, are rather broadly looking for possible good matches. Additionally, there may be multiple opportunities available. Candidates with a subset of specific skills and qualifications are great matches for different options within the same hiring action. Multiple hires from one job announcement are relatively common, particularly for internships. It is also possible for résumés to be passed from one department to another. A hiring manager may recognize that what might not be a good fit for them may be a great fit for their colleague’s team.
Pikounis: With proper expectations, yes, if the interest is strong. The one qualification I believe is negotiable with a prospective employer is the label of the major you are pursuing. Statistical internships no longer require only statistics majors. Any quantitative major should be considered, for example data science, informatics, etc.
What advice would you offer to address the missing qualifications?
Mannshardt: Focus on existing strengths and highlight relevant experience in your application materials. Be sure to include applicable job announcement wording in your résumé and cover letter. Missing qualifications can be addressed at the interview stage if the hiring manager inquires. You can point out similar skills (e.g., no direct Python programming experience but fluent in R/Julia over multiple types of projects) and discuss options for training and any necessary courses. Employers are looking for enthusiastic people who are willing to learn and tackle new projects.
Pikounis: Incorporate a description of your statistics-related skills and accomplishments in your CV / résumé. If interviewed for a position, be prepared to describe these.
Internship listings often list desired skills. What should an applicant do to communicate they have those desired skills?
Mannshardt: Highlighting relevant projects can be a way to showcase your experience and desired skills in a particular area. This can also serve to show collaborative work across scientific disciplines. List a couple of key tasks and/or milestones to which you heavily contributed or on which you regularly worked; describe any deliverable (article, report, presentation to management, etc.) Your résumé and cover letter should be updated for and tailored to each application. If you have worked on three main projects, they may all be listed on your résumé or CV, but consider emphasizing the most relevant project in your cover letter—possibly including a few technical details, your individual contributions, and what your learned or what experience you gained. Include applicable wording from the announcement in your own materials.
Pikounis: Concise, concrete, specific examples that demonstrate skills and accomplished results of value will strengthen the CV/résumé to be noticed favorably.
Is an online presence required? Should candidates have a digital portfolio, be on LinkedIn, etc.?
Mannshardt: It can, of course, be helpful to have an online presence but, in my experience, an extensive online presence is not required, particularly at the internship stage. In my experience hiring interns, initial screenings are done via the résumé and cover letter. There is often not time to do a detailed walk-through of each intern applicant’s full set of online materials. However, skimming for relevant work may happen for top applicants within the résumé pool. This may be different across other industries and organizations. Other hiring managers may look extensively at applicants’ digital portfolio and/or LinkedIn.
Pikounis: Not required but is nice to have, as long as it may add important information not present in the CV / résumé application.
In addition to the internship listings on STATtr@k, are there other sources someone should check?
Mannshardt: There are many sources for job postings. Regularly checking ASA listservs and section and chapter websites should yield multiple options within specific topics and locations. For federal government employment, there are also multiple options. All federal jobs are posted on usajobs.gov, and there are additional sites specific to internships and new graduates, including Open Opportunities—government-wide program offering professional development opportunities to current federal employees and internships to students—and the Federal Pathways program for federal internships. Federal job announcements are often posted for short periods of time—often five business days. I highly recommend those interested in federal employment set up a profile on USAJOBS. You can customize job search options that will notify you of postings that match the parameters you have set for each search—key words, job series (statistician, data scientist, IT, etc.), and location and/or agency/department.
Pikounis: Yes! Choose a company in an industry you are interested in and search their careers / job posting online site directly or use a search engine such as Google with company and industry terms and a phrase such as “summer internship.” Along with advice to prepare your CV / résumé, check with your university resources for all potential channels.
Most internship applications require the submission of a CV. What advice do you have for creating and organizing a CV?
Mannshardt: How you organize your CV may be somewhat dependent on what types of positions you are applying for. For example, my academic CV lists my research projects and areas of interest before my job experience, whereas my nonacademic résumé puts my work experience and job titles at the top. Possible sections: degree (earned and upcoming); relevant work experience and past positions; key projects, including tasks/deliverables; relevant courses and specialized skills such as programming languages; volunteer work and professional service (e.g., ASA); awards; and publications.
What questions should a candidate ask to make sure the internship is a good fit?
Mannshardt: Who will you be directly working with? Will you have a mentor and guidance on day-to-day tasks, or will you be working largely independently? Ask about the team. Are you one of many, or will you be working on a solo project? Ask about what is of interest to you. Do you want to ML program all day? Do you want to work on one intense project for the entirety of your internship or are you interested in multiple projects? Are you looking for project management experience? Inquire as to the top priority on their side for the outcome of the internship. Is there a project that needs to be completed by a specific deadline? Are they doing general long-term research? What are they looking to get from their interns during the duration of the internship?
Pikounis: What will constitute a successful internship, from your perspective? What particularly stands out in your organization’s culture? What projects do you foresee me working on?
“Speaking from personal experience, I learned just as much in my own internships as I did in any one specific course. Internships can also provide a chance to explore a particular field. Internships can help you determine what may (or may not!) be of interest to you—and one may even point you to a career path or opportunity you might not have otherwise considered.”—Elizabeth Mannshardt
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