You graduated two weeks ago and you don’t know what you’re going to do with your life, much less the rest of the summer. Or you lost your job a year ago and you haven’t gone to a job interview in three months. Or the company you signed onto for the summer just filed for bankruptcy.
Quick – let’s heat up a summer job. It’s time to create an instant internship. That’s my term for an internship that is almost as easy to cook up as a barbecue for five friends.
This quick-made internship may not spring forth from the top tier law firms or at old-fashioned manufacturing companies struggling to keep its current workers in paychecks. And they may not pay as much as you think you’re worth – but they’re not volunteer work either. It is possible to develop an instant internship with a little ingenuity, luck and sales abilities. And it’s possible to take an internship even if you’re 33 or 57, especially if you’re changing careers or have been out of the workforce for a few years.
Here’s seven strategies for stirring up a short-term assignment in a hurry:

• Search for successes. Look for organizations in your city that cannot keep up with demand. They are hot and they are in need of new staff. They may be in health care (see my article on healthy careers from the Washington Post) or mobile communications (such as those that develop advertising or specialized apps for our cell phones). Professional, scientific and technical employers are the most likely to hire this year, acccording to the Society for Human Resource Management, and that includes marketing and engineering firms and laboratories. Hint: Do some research on their products or service and growth plans so when you query them you’re already matching your talents to their success tracks or needs.

• Drop out, drop in. Major companies choose their interns in February or March. So by June, a few have thought better of it – or found something better. When they drop out, you could fill in, suggests Mark Oldman, Vault.com co-founder said.  So contact the internship coordinator now and offer to serve as the relief pitcher- which after all is the one who often wins the game.
• Go face to face.  Visit a half dozen organizations in a business park and introduce yourself as their problem-solving. high-energy intern (or other words that make you sound very appealing). Go mainly to smaller or mid-size employers and you could stumble upon a job before they’ve posted it, according to Richard Bolles, author of What Color is Your Parachute? books. This direct approach is one of his top 5 best job search strategies (you can see all five as they appeared in his book  “The Job-Hunters Survival Guide.” (Ten Speed Press, $9.99, 102 pages)  which was excerpted with a Washington Post article last year.
• Get personal. Ask Dad and Aunt Sue or your neighbor whose yard you used to mow for work, or leads.  Family ties and personal connections were the No. 1 way this year’s college graduates expect to find jobs, according to a Monster.com survey. While you’re at it, find a family member or professional friend to promote you online. Ask them to send out your qualifications on Twitter’s Hire Friday or in a LinkedIn status or other posting.
• Follow in a new executive. When a new CEO or CIO joins an organization, they want to put their stamp on the organization – and fast. So often they want their own team in place. If you time it right and write an excellent letter to that executive, you could come in as an executive assistant or intern to the chief. Vault’s Oldman told me about a similar strategy: Write a persuasive, personal letter to a half dozen senior executives offering to serve as their executive assistant / intern for the summer. Choose people in fields that interest you, then Google them. The letter must be customized to that person’s specific work and explain “why you’re excited to work with them,” Oldman told me. “It shows initiative.”
• Seek a one-month assignment. Maybe this won’t be a summer-long internship but it could be a vacation relief or maternity leave replacement slot.  Offer to work the midnight shift; the dirty, undesirable clean-up job; the runner or the person who fields calls and customers who walk in. And take the job with a smile – and then come up with some ways to do it and something a little more meaningful too. You can find these directly or go to a temp firm, which is a field that’s been growing lately too.
• Win the internship coordinator’s respect. Be personable, polite and persistent. Offer her help in recruiting for future internships. Offer to carry her boxes to the next recruiting fair in your region. Show a lot of interest. “If you’re on par with 10 other people, I’m going to see that person demonstrated their interest.  not one of 20 generic applications.  you’re putting your best self forward,” said the Smithsonian’s Tracie Spinale.  Even if you cannot land a summer internship, you’re putting yourself in place for one in the fall, when the competition is less fierce.

Some of these instant internships may take a week or three to work out. And some may pay less than the $17 an hour average pay for the college-student internship, as reported by the National Association of Colleges and Employers. (That average may be high because many of the better companies respond to NACE’s surveys.)

But most are ways to find “the hidden job market” of unadvertised possibilities and openings – where by some accounts more than half of all jobs are. Learn to succeed at that and anything they throw at you in your internship or the real jobs after it will be like mixing lemonade for your barbecue – sweet and cool.

If you missed the university graduation yet want to encourage the graduate, we have another shelf of great books to inspire and advise graduates.

Some of them show up in my short Washington Post article this weekend – recommended by a bookseller at Politics & Prose in D.C.  among others. Others show up here, recommended by Nicola Rooney, owner of another independent book store in Ann Arbor, and by Martha Finney, a former journalist and author. A couple come from the Books for a Better Life Award, given annually to exceptional self-help and motivational titles.

Finney, a former business writer now writes books such as “Rebound / A Proven Plan for Starting Over After Job Loss ” and “HR from the Heart / Inspiring Stories and Strategies …..” Finney also runs team-building workshops and speaks and consults on employee engagement.

Self-Reliance and Other Essays, by Ralph Waldo Emerson.  The  American philosopher tells us that it’s necessary to think for ourselves and not abandon our sense of right and wrong, especially facing external, societal pressures to take the easy route. “Although he lived and wrote in the 19th Century, his thoughts about independence and individualism are as relevant and inspiring today as they were when the ink was still fresh.”

Leaving Microsoft to Change the World: An Entrepreneur’s Odyssey to Educate the World’s Children, by John Wood. This wonderful story shows the power an individual has to make a difference to millions of strangers, with more than a little bit of help from his friends. Said Finney: “If I were to give this book to a new graduate, I hope its lessons would inspire my young friend to stay hopeful, energetic, observant, grateful, and passionate about the world.”

Find Your Calling, Love Your Life, by Martha I. Finney and Deborah Dasch.  This is a hopeful, inspiring collection of interviews with ordinary Americans who discovered who they are and their place in the world through adventures in finding their right life’s work. Although out of print, Finney is kindly offering a free ebook. Request a copy from her: martha@marthafinney.com.

The Books for a Better Life awards, given annually by the the National Multiple Sclerosis Society’s New York Chapter, include several worth considering. These winners are from this year’s awards and include book descriptions culled from Amazon.com and various book reviews:

Strength in What Remains by Tracy Kidder, Random House, won in the inspirational memoir category. It tells the story of a medical student who flees the horrors of war-gorn Africa and arrives with $200 and delivers groceries to well-to-do New Yorkers. The New York Times called the book “one of the truly stunning books…this year.”

Connected: The Surprising Power of Our Social Networks and How They Shape Our Lives By Nicholas A. Christakis M.D. and James H. Fowler won the psychology award. Book describes the science of our connections – and how they spread happiness, weight gain and political views.

Nicola Rooney owner of Nicola’s Books in Ann Arbor is a former engineer who says her choices “reflect my analytical tendencies. Choosing a career is too important to leave just to touchy feely.” Her choices:
Discover What You’re best At by Linda Gale, Fireside Books. The premise: You enjoy doing things you are good at, so for a happy career, pick one that matches your skills.  The book sets out several tests to pinpoint your skill set, then using the reults guide in the back, it groups the type of career path that utilizes those skills. For anyone who is uncertain which direction to take, this book give some great pointers and may broaden your outlook into new areas.

What Color is Your Parachute by Richard Bolles,  Ten Speed Press. Now in its 40th year, still probably the best, most practical, proven method for organizing your job search. It’s useful for new job seekers, as well as mid career job shifts.  The book is updated every year to reflect the current job market, but is solidly based on experience and covers much more than just resume writing and interview techniques. (Elmer aside: See my Washington Post interview with Bolles from a year ago for a sampling of his  search strategies thinking.)

Do What You Are:  Discover the Perfect Career for You through the Secrets of Personality Type. By Paul Tieger and Barbara Barron  Little Brown  This one counterbalances the first one,with its focus on the good match between your temperament and your job equaling a rewarding outcome.  The book explains Personality Types, using the Myers-Briggs system.  Myers -Briggs tests are conducted by professionals, but the ideas in the book are valuable in general for instilling some structure into planning your career.  It offers suggestions on career paths likely to suit your personality.

I will suggest a few books myself, and serve up a few more suggestions from my experts, in my third post on inspiring graduates books that will be posted by Wednesday.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

My thanks to Martha Finney and Nicola Rooney for their contributions to this blog. I am friendly with both of them, but have no business relationships. Nor do I earn anything from the sale of any of these books.

Graduates this year are leaving commencement and entering a work world that has challenges and opportunities, holes and hopefulness, continuity and lots of change.

So they may need extra guidance on establishing their careers and navigating the complexities of being the new kid in a company that laid off one in five workers just months earlier. Or they may take a job they don’t really like, just to land safely. (The acceptance rate rose sharply among college graduates this year, and one fourth of them have jobs waiting for them, according to the National Association of Colleges and Employers.)

If you know a graduate and are wondering what to give her or him, I’ve asked some creative and smart people who love books to recommend their best picks for young adults. The books are a mix of career, business and life titles – some old and some new. And the blog post comes in two part, with a second helping of ideas including some of my choices.

The selections and  commentary come directly from my respected colleagues and from an independent bookstore in Ann Arbor that I appreciate. I hope they will prove valuable for high school and college graduates, though they are aimed primarily at the university departures.

Here then are the great books for grads, part 1:

Barbara J. Winter, author of Making a Living Without a Job and a woman who leads seminars on being “joyfully jobless” also calls herself a “passionate reader” and intrepid traveler. Barbara Winter’s picks:

1. ROADTRIP NATION by Mike Marriner and Nathan Gebhard. The book began with a conversation between two college friends who realized they had very few ideas about career options. They set off on a cross-country trip to interview people doing unique and interesting things and along the way got excited about their own futures.

2.  A WHOLE NEW MIND by Daniel H. Pink is subtitled Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future. Pink makes a strong case for preparing for the future by learning to think like a creative innovator. And he shows us how to do that.

3. MAKE THE IMPOSSIBLE POSSIBLE by Bill Strickland is the inspiring and astonishing story of the author’s courage to dream bigger and make his Pittsburgh ghetto a better place to live. Along the way, he impacts thousands of lives by helping others do the same. He shows us that a nurturing environment can erase years of bad lessons.  (I heartily recommend this one too.)

4 .College grads will  find plenty of encouragement in a new book called DELIVERING HAPPINESS by Tony Hsieh, the founder of Zappos. It’s an inside look at how this Harvard grad become a successful entrepreneur and inspiration to employees.

Jim Pawlak has a varied background: He worked for Ford Motor Credit for a decade, then wrote about job search and careers for several newspapers, including the Detroit Free Press, where I helped him launch his writing career. He still writes Biz Books for newspapers including the Dallas Morning News. Pawlak’s picks:

5.  101 THINGS  I LEARNED IN BUSINESS SCHOOL by Michael Pries, Grand Central Publishing, $15.  It’s Business Basics 101 – ideal for the liberal arts grads who haven’t taken business courses.  Good guide to understanding how business does business.

6. FULL THROTTLE: 122 STRATEGIES TO SUPERCHARGE YOUR PERFORMANCE AT WORK by Greg Steinberg, John Wiley & Sons, $22.95.  Find your passion.  Create your path.  Make the committment.  Enjoy your journey.

7. MOJO – HOW TO GET IT, HOW TO KEEP IT by Marshall Goldsmith, Hyperion Books, $26.99. When you’ve got your mojo working, you’re in the make-it-happen zone.  You push boundaries.  Without mojo, you remain in your let-it-happen comfort or danger zone.

Rachel Pastiva, manager of Crazy Wisdom, an independent bookseller and tea room in downtown  Ann Arbor, is surrounded by books on subjects ranging from natural health to world religions to careers. Her  Crazy Wisdom recommendations for grads:

8. DIY U: EDUPUNKS, EDUPRENEURS AND THE COMING TRANSFORMATION OF HIGHER EDUCATION by Anya Kamentz. Not a light read by any means, this book is a serious look at the cost of higher education and why it needs to change. I  recommend this book as a gift to high school graduates or any graduate considering further education. It’s a good primer on higher education in the United States that will inspire students to actively contemplate what they want from their future.

9. GUARDIANS OF BEING words by Eckhart Tolle and art by Patrick McDonnell. While  this is a great gift book for anyone, t will particularly resonate with animal lovers and dog lovers. Whimsically illustrated by the creator of the comic strip Mutts, this book reminds us how to live in the moment. This is Pastiva’s personal favorite. This is not a book to read once! Each reading of this beautiful book offers new insight and inspiration.

10. YOU MAJORED IN WHAT? MAPPING YOUR PATH FROM CHAOS TO CAREER by Katharine Brooks, ED.D. This is a great title for students graduating college who are looking for guidance on what career path to pursue. Unlike any other book on careers, this book helps the reader map out his/her unique path by assessing not only education, but life experiences and other interests.

A big thanks to Crazy Wisdom and Rachel Pastiva, Jim Pawlak and Barbara Winter for generously sharing their time and wisdom. While I’m friendly with all three and actively support independent booksellers, I have no business relationship with any of them or in mentioning any of these books.