Interns Making an Impact

Being an intern at Cadence was a rewarding and impactful experience that kickstarted my career. I got a firsthand view of life in Silicon Valley working with a tech company. Being an intern at a FORTUNE 100 Best Companies to Work For® came with the expected perks such as fun socials, cool giveaways, and a lot of free food! What I didn’t expect was just how much I would learn in my role and the abundance of support and encouragement I received from my team to challenge myself and grow into my career.

One of the most impactful moments for me was during the annual Intern Showcase. At the science fair-style showcase, interns present the work they’ve been a part of during their time with Cadence to a wide audience of employees and managers. They give demonstrations, answer questions, and share their experiences in the Cadence College Hires and Internships program (CHIPs). This intern showcase event is held at Cadence sites around the world.

What I enjoyed about the event was that it gave me the opportunity to converse and share the exciting details of my role with employees from around the company. I discussed my work on our Great Place to Work submission and other culture programs at Cadence. I even had the chance to present my work to our CEO Lip-Bu Tan. We discussed the importance of culture at an organization and how it can influence the way employees innovate and collaborate in their roles. It was a rewarding moment being able to show the deep impact that my job had on the organization and the importance of the work I was doing. This point was solidified even more when Lip-Bu shook my hand after my presentation and said, “thank you for your hard work.” It reaffirmed for me how impactful and important my work can be.

So when I became a full-time employee on the HR team, I was given the responsibility of managing our global internship program across 13 sites, and part of that responsibility was organizing the Intern Showcase for the next year’s batch of interns. As program manager, I am responsible for creating opportunities where interns can proudly share their work with Cadence leaders.

This year’s event was the largest in San Jose history, with over 63 interns presenting. The topics of their presentations ranged from artificial intelligence, to cloud computing, to systems management. The interns’ work covers many different facets of the technology industry. It is truly inspiring to see these young professionals play a key role in helping to create revolutionary products for our customers. Paul McLellan, renowned Breakfast Bytes Blogger, was also on hand at the event to interview a few interns and highlight in more detail some of their work in a Breakfast Bytes blog post. Similar showcase events were held at our sites in Austin, Texas; Chelmsford, Massachusetts; and Feldkirchen, Germany. 

The event concluded with a carnival-style celebratory mixer with executive management team members. Toward the end of the event, there was a moment where I looked around and saw interns playing games, taking pictures together, and proudly discussing their presentations. I saw pure joy on their faces. I knew that they were having a great time and were proud of the work they’d done with Cadence.

As Cadence continues to expand its business, it’s exciting to see how new opportunities open up for this community of young innovators early in their careers and how the CHIPs program and events like Intern Showcase support this opportunity.