Internship learning journal guidelines

In the early stages of your internship, you will be required to start a

learning journal. This journal is the first step of the management online
course. The learning journal will provide you with “raw” content to
analyze during the course and help you prepare the course assessment
also. The keeping of a learning journal is highly recommended.

What is a learning journal?

A learning journal is a systematic and analytical record of your observations,
experiences and analyses. It is more than a diary, which typically contains only your
thoughts and activities, and more than just a recording log, which is simply a listing of
events. A good learning journal makes thoughtful connections between theory and
practice.

Why keep a learning journal?

An internship is a very interesting moment for you. You will have the opportunity to
discover a company, a professional role and tasks, how to be part of a team. The value
of your internship is not only in your daily role but also in the observations and analysis
you can make of the situation, which will improve your understanding and skills but
also help to identify a career path.
We would like you to observe and analyze your company through this learning journal,
particularly how your team is managed and how the team performs/behaves.

Learning journal framework

When should you start?

It is very important to start your journal in the early stages of your internship. Why?
Because at the beginning of your internship your observations and reflections will be
objective as they are not yet influenced by your experiences and colleagues.
Remember to date your journal entries…

Of course, as you progress in internship, you will begin to understand the company
better and this will bring you to raise other questions. We advise you to take a little
time every week to complete your journal. It can, of course, be more often!

What will you use it for?

You will use this journal to help you better understand the concepts and tools you will
learn during the online management class. It will also be the first step of the class
assessment: you will use the elements observed and the issues identified to
make an analysis of the management in your company/team.
What should you include?
To help you observe and analyze, you can use a template like this:

The company in Your team:

general Manager and co-
workers
What is surprising?

• At the beginning of your internship:

the elements you didn’t expect at
all. They can be positive or
negative.
• Your weekly observations: as you
learn more about the company,
which elements are surprising in
the way it works? Either because
they’re surprising for such a
company (depending on its size,
business, etc.) or because it
doesn’t seem very logical (in terms
of business and team
management).

What is interesting?

• At the beginning of your internship:

what seems interesting in the way
this company works? In the
products it proposes, in its
organization, in the way it
manages the business / its
employees, …
• Your weekly observations: as you
learn more about the company and
its market, what is interesting
(maybe different?) in the way it
works, and it’s organized?

What could be improved?

• At the beginning of your

internship: you may identify some
elements that don’t really seem to
work and that could be improved
(business ones, team
management ones …).
• Your weekly observations: as you
learn more about the company you
may identify additional issues.