What makes people want to stay? Let’s hear directly from the mouths of these four extraordinary interns to employees!
EIM has a long history of elevating people from within, including many interns who have continued on as full time employees! We got to sit down with four of EIM’s former interns and our President, Alex Henkel, to discuss why internships are such an important part of EIM’s culture.
Senior Product Specialist Cecilia Robinson
BA Sustainable Product Design & Innovation, Keene State College
Cecilia is a staple at EIM and a big part of our innovative R & D Team! Cecilia was in school at Keene State when she received an email prompting students on her course to apply for an internship. Being a young person just getting started, it is always a little scary starting out when it has to do with careers! Regardless, Cecilia decided to apply for the internship. She applied, interviewed, and landed the opportunity!
Cecilia’s major in Sustainable Product Design gave her a great perspective for working in the Products department. She began working closely with our Director of Technical Solutions, Juan Munoz, as a product assistant. Over the course of her internship she learned the label making ropes, and brought many important insights and contributions to our product development process.
When it came time to wind down the internship, it was clear Cecilia was an asset to the team and company as a whole!
What inspired her to stay? Cecilia loved the people she got to know during her internship. She appreciated the culture of caring and dedication to innovation and quality. She has hit many personal and professional milestones during her time at EIM . . . including having kids! She was thrilled to learn that EIM was a family friendly workplace that would support her needs as a new parent, in particular by taking part in the Babies at Work program.
Alex’s Take: “Cecilia helped refresh our connections to both Keene State College, especially the Sustainable Product Design Department, and Keene High School as an alumnae of both institutions.”
Safety Coordinator & Prepress Technician Briana Leighton
BA Graphic Design, Keene State College
When Briana began her internship during her sophomore year of college, she really did not know what to expect. Would she be fetching coffee for someone? Would she be doing paperwork or surface level tasks? Not at all! In fact, she would be doing far more than office tasks. Her work was going to be hands on technical graphic design experience in Prepress!
Although she is still part of the PrePress department today, Briana’s role has evolved a lot over the years. These days, she spends a lot of her time as Safety Coordinator. Briana ensures that everyone is aware of potential workplace hazards, that the work environment is safe, and any concerns related to safety are addressed. She is always there to offer solutions, from teaching people how to have better ergonomics at their workstation, to making sure we are employing best safety practices and following OSHA standards.
Safety is a big deal in manufacturing, and we are so glad she is helping keep our practices up to date and our employees safe in the workplace!
What inspired her to stay? Briana loves learning. At EIM the opportunities to grow are never in short supply. “I like the investment in our education. I am very much a person who enjoys learning new things and my work as safety coordinator is rewarding. I feel like I am making a difference.”
Alex’s Take: “Briana has combined her experience in prepress and helping on the production floor to help us be proactive in safety. In addition to being a talented graphic designer, she is regularly looking for the root cause of safety issues and always ensures clear communication with our entire team.”
Prepress Technician Paige Bourne
BA Graphic Design, Keene State College
Paige is a Graphic Designer by education and EIM employee by way of internship. In fact, Paige has been with EIM for 8 years now! She is one of the folks behind the scenes of prepress.
Paige spent her first year in prepress learning all the ins and outs of barcode label design. In prepress, the details are imperative. It involves a deep layer of precision and requires a person to check, recheck, and then check again. Why? If labels with complex sequential data go to print incorrectly, not only does it open the door for big issues for the customer, but it can also be a costly mistake for the label manufacturer as well.
Within a very short time, Paige became one of our prepress pros! In fact, soon after graduating, she and Cecilia got to collaborate on bringing to life one of our local business’ new brand look, creating labels for The Bread Shed!
What inspired her to stay? “The flexibility to work from home is a huge benefit,” Paige says. “I like doing the work I do in prepress and being able to do it remotely. The people at the company are great to work with and even though I’m not in the office, I still feel like part of the team.”
Alex’s Take: “Paige is a great problem-solver to assemble complex sets of variable data combined with innovative design. When I worked with tech support and prepress, she often would trouble-shoot a needed solution and then share it with the rest of the prepress team.”
Graphic Designer Elena Babushkina
BFA Graphic Design, Keene State College
Elena is our graphic design guru! Her amazing creative skills help bring life to our marketing initiatives. Elena wanted to pursue an internship at EIM because she saw a landscape of opportunities: learning how to apply her graphic design skills to a highly specialized B2B brand. Both a challenge and a chance to let her design skills shine! Getting to work with long-time employees and high-level leaders was also exciting and educational.
When she started her internship, Elena had not planned on continuing at EIM after college, but when the opportunity arose post-graduation, she was excited to stay on as a full-time Graphic Designer!
What inspired her to stay? “The people and the opportunity to make a difference was why I stayed. I felt that I could bring new life and energy to designs. I like making things look fun and exciting! Everyone at EIM is so kind and that makes it a great work experience. The flexibility of a hybrid position is also amazing!”
Alex’s Take: “Elena has enthusiastically contributed to marketing, photography, prepress, and production support, learning a great deal about our company in the process. Her flexibility and willingness to learn has been very much appreciated!”
Creating Career Opportunities for New Hampshire Students
Over the years, Alex has been a big driver of EIM partnering with local schools to create internship opportunities. As you can see from his previous quotes, he had a LOT to say about the contributions Cecilia, Briana, Paige, and Elena have made at EIM! In fact, Alex has made the positive impact of internships central to his ongoing Doctor of Business Administration studies, and will be delving into researching “how high-quality internships can help young professionals find full-time opportunities in rural areas.” Now that’s dedication, right?!
Creating opportunities for students just starting their careers has been a tremendous success for us. Not only are we helping students put work and education in context, we are also opening doors in their professional lives. We might be a global distributor of high-quality labels, but we are grateful we get to create many career opportunities locally!
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