Here at TripleMint, we’ve heard enough intern horror stories – getting coffee for the whole office, or filling in endless spreadsheets for six weeks – that we felt motivated to do something about it. Although it has negative connotations, it can be a great way for young people to learn more about the world of work, if done properly. With that in mind, we decided to take on some high school interns to give them a genuine experience working in a fast-growing New York City startup.
Our wonderful high school interns have been a great help, getting stuck in with a whole range of tasks across several departments. To show our appreciation for all the help they have given us, TripleMint is featuring our own high school interns for Intern Appreciation Day!
Our interns come to us through Futures and Options, an incredible organization that connects urban youth with opportunities at New York City businesses. So this Intern Appreciation Day, we at TripleMint are expressing our gratitude to our wonderful interns and the organization that brought them to us.
“At Futures and Options we believe that interning is so important because it enables young people to experience the workforce in a supportive and professional environment, explore potential career paths, and gain essential skills necessary to succeed in today’s workforce. We seek to empower NYC’s young people by offering them access to careers and networking opportunities they may have not had otherwise. Future and Options strives to open doors for the students we serve.” – Corey Ogliby
We sat down with Kate Appiah, Arielle Bramble, and Sam Stamler to find out their thoughts on TripleMint, business, and their future careers.
Hello guys and gals how are you three?
All: Good!
So for National Intern Appreciation Day, we are going to be interviewing you for our blog. I’ll start by asking how did you find TripleMint?
Kate & Arielle: We both found TripleMint through Futures and Options – our guidance counselors recommended us, and then we were interviewed to see what areas we were interested in. We both were placed at TripleMint, and we still meet with our group leaders once a week to talk about ho we’re doing. It’s kind of like mentoring – it’s great.
Why did you choose TripleMint?
Sam: I liked what they were doing in terms of changing the real estate market.
Arielle: The work environment is very open and very welcoming – working in a newer company like TripleMint is really cool like that.
Kate: Yeah, I enjoy the culture offered here and how relaxed everyone is!
Favorite thing about TripleMint?
Sam: Food. But seriously, how open people are to talking with each other and collaborating on projects.
Kate: I really love the objective of the company – it’s a really cool goal.
Pop quiz…What is the objective of the company?
Arielle: To integrate technology into real estate, making it more advanced and easier for the customer.
Sam: TripleMint has a lot of different apartments to make agent’s lives more fluid. It uses technology and the prospecting department to help the agents. (Sam pulled his laptop and quoted from our website. -Ed.)
Kate: It is the refreshingly simple, less stressful, trustworthy, and helpful way to buy and sell houses as well as rent, and it emphasizes customer satisfaction.
What are your future aspirations?
Kate: I want to open a marketing firm in order to help companies grow through selling themselves and reaching out to the public.
Sam: I want to keep working in startups. You get to communicate with a lot more people and do more interesting tasks.
Arielle: I’m stuck between accounting and programming. I feel like being an accountant is gonna be boring. When programming, you get to be a part of everything and you can help everyone.
What do you do in your free time?
Arielle: I love Kate Spade bags. And I like to drive. It’ll be driving and shopping for my free time.
Sam: I like to play baseball; I play second base and shortstop. I also do a lot of volunteer work. I really like volunteering because you get to show freshmen how things work. I also like working in the engineering department at my school.
Kate: In my free time I play soccer, go to church, and do math problems. (Sam: You do math problems for fun?) Yeah, I have a book! I also do community service; there’s a food pantry at my church where I help out, and I’m part of a dance group.
What would you do if you had a million dollars?
Arielle: I would buy something nice and put some towards college and use the rest to buy a car. Wait how much left would I have? Nevermind, I would give the rest to my mother.
Sam: I would buy season tickets front row behind home plate for the Yankees. I might invest with some of it and probably save the rest.
Kate: 1/10 of it will go to tithes, the other 3/10 will go to parents, 2/10 goes to saving, 1/10 goes into investing; so I have 3/10 left. 1/10 will go to renovating my church and 1/10 might go to my brothers, another 1/10 would go into starting a dance group.
What was your favorite project at TripleMint?
Arielle: Zillow (Zillow is a property website) leads. I had to organize all the information in the Zillow inbox and put it in a spreadsheet; I initially found it boringit but began to like it in the end.
Sam: I really liked working with Chris (one of our lead generation specialists) on contacting potential clients.
Kate: When I worked with Michael Bethoney (one of our real estate specialists); he gave me the client’s criteria for what they wanted, and I had to do lots of research online to match up those criteria. It was interesting to see because I didn’t know houses like those existed.
What will you miss about us:
Sam: The people.
Arielle: The people.
Kate: I will miss everything. Like how annoying this one (Sam) is and the friendly environment.
TripleMint thanks Arielle, Kate, and Sam for all their hard work. In only a short period of time they have made a big impact on our company. Their enthusiasm and energy was appreciated across the company: they will be missed around the office.
