The Intern Diaries: Renewed for Season 2

We’ve seen a lot of things come back in style recently. Baggy jeans, bucket hats and Converse sneakers are all making a resurgence. And just like that *cue the confetti cannons* so is the Intern Diaries! We’re hard-launching Season 2 with 28 new cast members who are eager to shake things up. Join us for a thrilling three months of elite lunches (definitely), new learnings (hopefully) and plenty of drama (the good kind).

We <3 Craft Services

The interns’ first day kicked off with–you guessed it–free food! On this particular Wednesday, it was bagels and every type of cream cheese you can imagine. While we’re thrilled to have new interns for Legitimate Work Purposes^TM, we also love extra treats for the rest of us! A whole year later and I’m still talking about the food.

After being showered with bagels galore and swag most fab (nothing but the best for our celebrities), the interns got to meet their laptops and learn how to laptop. I imagine they picked it up pretty quickly, because they’re obviously tech pros already. Still, it’s nice to have dedicated time to set everything up and then immediately change all the displays to [insert favorite color here]. I simply can’t work in an environment where my highlighter text isn’t pink.

Classic Shots of Chicago to Set the Scene

They may not have toured the city just yet, but the interns did get a walkthrough of the Chicago office to get familiar with all the snack and beverage locations, as well as where to hide said snacks. (It can get competitive; I think I saw Cinnamon Scooby Snacks once.)

If you missed the tour, get all the good bits here:

According to people other than me, the office tour was kind of a vibe. Says HR Analytics intern Patrick Helfrich, “Walking through the office on orientation day, I was blown away by how much thought was put into every last detail to improve the employee experience on site. As a sugar addict, my favorite part has to be the Skittles tube. I am truly thankful to be with an organization that cares so much about the employee experience!” Love that for you, Patrick. And if you need help weaning off the tubes, my group Snack Lovers Anonymous meets once a month in a carb-free, sugar-free, gluten-free basement.

Focusing on Audience Engagement

Hightower has something called Engagement Days a couple times a month where everyone who works out of Chicago (plus a few guest stars!) comes into the office. There are always exciting things planned on these days to ensure the commute is worth it. Some recent examples include: a bouquet-making class, gingerbread house competition and a special screening of Angst for mental health awareness. So I guess you can have fun at work? Alert the masses!

The interns’ start day was intentionally planned for an Engagement Day so they could get to know their colleagues and participate in some of the fun. Our activity this week was one of the things we are doing for Pride Month! We assigned a color to every department to make a rainbow pic with our new pride/Hightower/Pridetower flag. As you can see, some people even followed the rules and wore the right color. It proved to be a nice break from onboarding and allowed the interns to meet some of their fellow department team members.

A Glowing 99% on Rotten Tomatoes

OK, it was just Webex*. But still touching, nonetheless! Service and Implementation intern Josey Hackemack had some nice things to say about her experience thus far: “My first week at Hightower was amazing – everything from the environment to the people. I only have positive things to say about my team and everyone that I am working with, as they value the importance of teamwork, engagement and a drive for growth.” Five stars for Hightower and five stars for you, Josey! (And five stars for your pretty sweet name if I do say so myself.)

*Our internal chat platform/gif generator.

Well, there you have it. The Season 2 Cast has been released! We can’t wait to see what you accomplish over the next few months.

I have a hard stop at…now…but tune in next week to see what the interns are moving the needle on with their dynamic synergies!