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Microsoft Interns Still Feel the Love
theodp writes "Despite layoffs and a blip in earnings, the Chicago Trib reports that Microsoft's summer interns still enjoy the VIP treatment. Although there were 20% fewer of them this year than last, still 85% of the interns are offered full-time jobs. In addition to being paid $4,600-$6,000 a month, a housing stipend, and relocation costs for the summer, the 600 or so Microsoft apprentices enjoyed other perks — such as a police escort to speed their way to a private museum party where they screened the most recent Harry Potter movie and were given a free Xbox 360. 'You feel like royalty to be escorted by police,' said Joriz De Guzman, an intern working toward his MBA at Wharton. BTW, before he got mixed up with those MBA-types, De Guzman earned some fame as the Doogie Howser of computer science."
This version of the story has some more defensiveness that elaborates more on that:
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
I think most of the interns are CS majors; they're actually pretty common among computer science students, probably 2nd only to the giant flood of Google interns.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Microsoft Police Escort
Look where all this talking got us, baby.
I'd still love to know the secret [of how to get an MS internship].
Big lips and a slack jaw.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
Just came back from the screening and yeah, that got me real angry too. Under the benefits section of the contract, I had no idea that the "free escort" was a lousy trip to the museum to see Harry Potter ! And I already had an Xbox !
In a world where many people have never made a phone call, where children still get polio or die from malaria, where there are some people who make less than $30 USD in a year, let me be the first to say FUCK YOU! Seriously, Libertarian001, what the hell is the matter with you? You honestly think that showing off by using the luxury of an internet connection and personal computer to bitch about other people's fortune is a good idea? Asshole.
Perspective, it's what's for dinner.
Since I can't tell them apart, I treat all ACs as the same person.
Interns working on products that are going to ship.
Okay, so that explains Vista...
#DeleteChrome
$4500-$6000 a month is a LOT of coin for pretty much most of the country not containing coastline.
Truthfully, this is real news to me, I never heard of interns making that kind of money. In this economy - and yes, I'm talking about the US - it just seems... absurd.
And paying them so much, too. What the fuck is WRONG with Microsoft?
I was one of Microsoft's interns some time ago and I can tell you that it was nothing like they described in the article. I was actually very poorly treated (and my boss was a big jerk). Amongst other things (mostly Denmark related, and not directly Microsoft), my boss was one of the reasons I didn't want to stay there and why I made sure I wouldn't.
But, it was in Denmark (Microsoft Development Center Copenhagen), so it seems to be something localized.
Onda Technology Institute
'You feel like royalty to be escorted by police,' said Joriz De Guzman, an intern working toward his MBA at Wharton
I don't know about this; when I got busted for drunk driving I had a police escort all the way to the station, but I didn't feel like royalty at all.
If this were Google, most of you'd be praising them, for being such a great employer.
How about we judge a software company by their software and business ethics, there's plenty of things to dislike Microsoft for in those departments...
+1 Funny Signature
Two basic things.
1) Your resume needs to get you an interview. This is easy if you're applying for an internship position at a school which MS actively recruits from. Not many secrets here. Try to engage a college recruiter in person at your school. Show an interest! Tell them about a project you've done outside of class. Tell them about that club you're an exec on (even if it is the nerdy math club or pot-smoking surfer's club!). Make yourself out to be well rounded and keen! That will get you an interview.
2) Interview skills! You need to ace the questions you're given. An interview for an internship is pretty short, less than an hour. Spend the first couple years of your CS degree doing http://topcoder.com/ competitions in your free time, ace your two or three algorithms/data-structures courses, and spend a day or two reviewing those same courses before an interview. Think of it as a programming competition. An internship question won't get into anything beyond those classes with the technical questions. If you have a friend who has ever taken any interview training, get him to run you through all the "so tell me about yourself" warmup questions half-a-dozen times. Learn to reference your past projects and experience while answering questions. Even if you know your shit (broadly speaking), if you're not prepared for the interview, you can only really blame yourself. If you've been focusing for the last year on your honor's thesis, review that 1st/2nd year material until you can teach it. You'll thank me :)
Wouldn't that be a gaggle of Google interns?
Good, inexpensive web hosting
Quite correct. Buying a permit, plus officer costs, plus vehicle rental, plus officer OT will get you your very own police escort. It's not that expensive. Probably around $600-900/per hr officer plus permit. You too can feel like a big shot, of course some companies to that just to feel big. Some companies also hire in clothes police as extra protection when their regular duty security can't cut the slack. Because even a cop who's on duty there is still a cop.
This is quite common in Canada for a lot of bars in University towns, they'll hire cops to patrol the floors/entrances just for the extra security. And the cops will send out their own as well just to show the flag(officer presence) to keep the peace.
Om, nomnomnom...
Good money, plenty of perks... this is not the Apple way.
A few years ago the company was on the brink of disaster and made huge salary cuts. Now they are making sh*tloads of money, thanks to the iPod and iPhone, but the salaries are still low. Last year, Techcrunch published data pulled from Glassdoor.com, showing that Apple engineers are paid 15-20% less than their counterparts at Google, Microsoft and Yahoo.
Some food for thought: who made more money at Microsoft? Steve Ballmer or Bill Gates? and who made more money at Apple? Steve Jobs or Steve Wozniak? Engineers always have been a commodities for Apple.
lucm, indeed.
I interned for Microsoft in 2008 and for Google last summer.
At Microsoft, we got a police escort to the zoo. But, to be honest, while the story casts it as a VIP thing, it's actually set up to minimize traffic disruption.
Microsoft has 800+ interns in the Redmond area, which means about 20 buses if they need to go anywhere at once. Attempting to push 20 buses through already congested streets is a nightmare. Better to shut down the roads for a couple of minutes than risk an accident or clog up the streets.
The housing benefit isn't exactly a steal. You can share an apartment (with another MS intern) for about $600/mo, or they will give you $3000 to find housing on your own. I chose the latter.
Relocation costs are effectively plane fare plus a couple of days of car rental, or mileage if you drive.
I was offered a full-time job, but I turned it down because I was more interested in graduate school. The full time job is contingent on working for the same group that you interned with. I must admit that the package they offer is pretty tempting.
Google paid me considerably more than Microsoft. I worked in my home city (Boulder CO), so I didn't need relocation or housing. I did get to spend a week in Mountain View (paid for by Google) for orientation and training.
Google didn't have any major events in Boulder, but I'm not sure about Mountain View.
Google's interview process was considerably easier than Microsoft's, but that's because at Microsoft interns go through the full interview process (for me, two phone interviews plus 4 interviews onsite at Microsoft). Google does not offer interns full-time jobs unless they go through a conversion process that includes the full interview track.
Both Microsoft and Google had me doing real work that went into actual products. My code was reviewed, just like a normal employee. I went to meetings, had performance evaluations, and worked an 8-9 hour day, just like a normal employee.
By the way, if anyone wants to know about the interview process:
- Neither company asks 'brain-teaser' questions anymore. It's straight-up CS fundamentals, algorithms, and data structures.
- I was interviewed by actual developers from the teams that I ended up working for. These people know their shit and will see through BS.
There's no magic trick or great mystery here. Either you know your shit and can get hired, or you don't and it will be apparent.
No offense, but as an MS intern from this past summer (who doesn't have a slashdot account), I disagree a bit with what you said.
MS does most of their recruiting from a few universities: Harvard, Stanford, MIT, CalTech, UT Austin, UW, etc. I attend one of these schools.
The MS interview process is fairly extensive, with several different weeding stages:
1) Resume. They'll take a quick glance at your GPA and decide if they want to interview you. There isn't much else they can look at since they get flooded with applications.
2) On campus interview. You'll spend 30 minutes talking to an engineer from MS.
3) Redmond Interview. You fly to Redmond to interview with potential teams. You'll have anywhere from 3 to 4 1-hour interviews in a single day. The questions can be varied, but expect to have to know more than data structures and be prepared to use some theory. They won't ask what the runtime of quicksort is.
Assuming you get through 1-3, accept the internship, then you'll essentially have a summer-long interview at the end of which they'll either offer you a full time job or another internship if you do a good job.
General Tips when Interviewing:
-Dress casually. I gave a presentation to several high-ups this summer wearing t-shirt and shorts. I was not underdressed.
-Think out loud. They're more interested in your thought process and approach to problems than they are in your solutions, much like showing your work on school work.
-Have fun with it. If you're at ease and relaxed, you'll do better.
Think about it though, would you have wanted an escort from Microsoft? She'd be bound to be full of viruses.
-ducks-
Random Thoughts From A Diseased Mind (Not For Dummies)
If the parent douchebag would have read what the person hes aiming this at was talking to, he would have realized it was sarcasm to point out the others idiocy... talk about woosh...
"It's ok, I'm completely secure as long as my iron is off"