Intern Summer Season!

Team Jefferies,

The beginning of June marks the start of our Intern Summer – that wonderful time when our offices and trading floors are overflowing with teams of smart, ambitious, inquisitive, motivated and impressionable soon-to-be Wall Street professionals. Here are some random thoughts for each of us to think about as our elevators get more crowded, the lunch lines a little longer and the conference rooms a little more congested:

1. Meet as many of these future leaders as you can. Not just a simple introduction but make the effort to get to really know them. We have an incredibly selective process whereby 338 summer interns are selected from 25,000+ applicants. It is doubtful that the two of us could have made it through this process. We bet each of you will be better for getting to know as many of these special, young individuals as possible over the next 10 weeks.
2. Make a point of identifying one or two (or perhaps maybe a small handful) and go out of your way to go beyond the call of duty and truly make an effort to become a mentor. Everyone is allowed to pick their own mentee(s). That is the best part of being a mentor. Certainly, the story and background of one or two of these interns will resonate with you and trigger a desire to take a broader professional interest in helping them with their careers. Everyone at Jefferies has something unique to offer in terms of experience, perspective and kindness. This is a time to share. We guarantee you will get more out of this experience than you give.
3. When interns are working in your area or for you directly, do your best to transparently show and explain what you do, why you do it and what you are trying to accomplish. Whenever possible, take the time to go into detail and always remember what a blank sheet you started with “way back when” (or last year!). These interns are super smart and will absorb information quickly, but we all must take the time to explain our world well and in a manner that they can best manage.
4. Bring interns (and our full-time juniors) with you to see clients. We have yet to meet the client who was offended by bringing the next generation to a meeting. In fact, it humanizes all of us and almost always results in a better (and more fun) meeting.
5. Interns are highly motivated and generally type A (just like all of us). They are all willing and eager (perhaps too eager) to give 1000%. It is up to every one of us to treat them with respect, kindness and prioritize their mental and physical health and overall safety. We all work hard and demand enormous amounts of effort from each other and we all know that workflow often gets even more intense the further down the hill it flows. There are always times where some sacrifices have to be made to serve our clients. That said, every one of us needs to treat our interns the way we would want someone at another firm to treat our own children. When work is light, send the interns home without guilt. When assignments need to be handed out, as long a lead time as possible with direct clarity is the rule. Each of us must keep our eyes and ears open to make sure our interns are treated fairly, professionally and with human care. The very same goes for our full-time juniors, so this is just another timely moment to remind all of us about how privileged we are for all of the full-time “younger” folks who do so much for the rest of us at Jefferies.

This is the very best time of year at Jefferies. The positivity and earnestness of the next generation joining us, even for just 10 weeks, is enough to put the wind in all of our respective sails for the rest of the year. Let’s enjoy this time and do our best to work together and ensure a strong second half of the year. The markets are open, our Firm has never been better positioned competitively and our clients need us more than ever to help them accomplish their goals. With a plethora of youthful talent at our sides, this should be a very good summer for Jefferies!

Enjoying that youthful extra bounce in our steps with all of you,

Rich and Brian