Just Do It: My Summer Internship with Nike
This summer, I had the opportunity to intern at Nike World Headquarters as a Product Creation Engineer. I had a lot of the same questions that you probably have right now, with the biggest being, “What does someone even do at Nike?” By the end of this article, I hope to give you some idea of what that is, and the biggest lessons I learned this summer.
As an engineer, I have become well-acquainted with how something as simple as a water bottle can require hours of complex engineering before it gets to the shelves. Shoes are no exception. When producing a shoe, you must ask yourself many of the same questions that come up in other engineering tasks, such as: What are the design specifications? What is the feasibility of this in manufacturing? What is the main service to the consumer? and many more. This, by no means, encompasses all of our product creation cycle, but hopefully gives you an idea of how quickly something that goes on your foot can turn into a matrix of considerations that takes many engineers to solve!
This only scratches the surface of what you can do at Nike. For all business savvy individuals, creative drivers, and cultural celebrators, there is room for you here as well. Nike has a place for everyone interested in taking a bold step into the world of footwear and apparel.
I know that it is hard as chemical engineers, in Southeast Texas, to look beyond the oil and gas industry for career options. However, I am here to tell you that sometimes, it takes a little leap of faith to realize the full potential of what your career can flourish into. There is one key advantage that an engineering degree will always grant, and that is the versatility to explore different industries.
If there is anything that you take away from this article, be it one day or 5 years after it was published, is that failure is part of success. Phil Knight famously said, “Fail Fast.” Take what you learn and run with it. If you do that, nothing you do is ever a true failure; simply a step in the right direction.
Have a great day, y’all :)
