<p>I would call back and leave a message indicating that you are not going to work for them this summer as something else came up (use the message that you planned to use). Voice Mail systems often have a time limit so make it relatively short. Then leave your phone number so that she can call you back if she wants to. She might choose not to call you back and then you’re done.</p>
<p>MY mistake, I must have misread an earlier post.</p>
<p>ab-- Leave a voice message, “I have been attempting to get in touch with you for a couple of days to let you know that, unfortunately, I will not be able to work there this summer. I wanted to make sure you were aware as soon as possible, which is why I am leaving this voice message. thank you for your time and consideration.”</p>
<p>Oh, and you can pretty much expect complete silence. In fact, remember when you were applying for internships, and they way they told you “no” was simply to not get in touch with you? you won’t talk to these people again.</p>
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<p>You mean when I asked for a 5th week of extension in early December? It did seem that they didn’t like me stalling so much.</p>
<p>I mean, back then it was already a big decision. I hadn’t explored my choices completely yet and they were pressuring me to accept. I didn’t really know what to do at all when they extended the offer in October.</p>
<p>You’ve been trying to contact them for 2 days now so at least leave them a voicemail to please call you back since you need to discuss the internship position with them. You don’t need to leave all of the details of your reneging in the VM - if it was me I’d rather discuss that ‘voice to voice’. </p>
<p>It doesn’t make sense that you can’t contact anyone in their HR department unless this is a very small company that has a 1 person HR department. What you’re likely doing is contacting one person’s extension where you can either talk to that person if they answer or leave a VM. Since they’re not answering, call the company’s main number and ask to speak to someone in the HR department and they should be able to forward you to someone who’s actually there.</p>
<p>Try to do this right now.</p>
<p>So I just called this contact again and did leave a voicemail that was pretty much along the lines of what poetgrl said, including the part where I will not be able to work there this summer. </p>
<p>So I also have the HR director’s phone number (she was the one who contacted me when I requested a 5th week of extension for my acceptance) and e-mail … should I reach out to her?</p>
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<p>No … A is big/Fortune 500… but their HR has a separate operation for people in IT.</p>
<p>UPDATE: Contact at A e-mailed me. She said she’ll notify the her boss and thanked me for trying to contact her.</p>
<p>Should I still call her?</p>
<p>No. Either she or her boss will contact you if they want to talk to you.</p>
<p>What would be the likelihood of that? I feel like my voicemail was too blunt and short (well cramming everything into a one minute message on the fly is tough)</p>
<p>If they don’t contact you, that’s fine. You did your part for now.</p>
<p>My son has been looking for a job and has had a lot of interviews. The usual response when they don’t want you is complete silence. I don’t know the likelihood of them calling you back but most employers, from our experience, just move on to the next person when one person isn’t available or wanted.</p>
<p>She did say thank-you which is a lot better than not showing up on the day that you’re expected to.</p>
<p>As an aside, we have this problem in India. Employees will all-of-a-sudden just not show up for work. When contacted, they say that they’ve accepted another job. I guess that’s the culture in a hot job market.</p>
<p>We had one guy in our group that actually took a position at another company without giving his notice to our company so he was technically working for both companies which were competitors. We bribed him to continue working for us.</p>
<p>^^ That’s weird - that’s the kind of employee I’d be happier to have out of the company.</p>
<p>She said she would tell her boss, and thanked you for trying to contact her. To me, it sounds like it is over.</p>
<p>Please remember that this is not a personal relationship. They just need to fill whatever intern spots they need for the summer.</p>
<p>And even though your voicemail may have been blunt or short (which is kind of unavoidable with voicemail), you also sent a nice letter, right? </p>
<p>In any case, I think her sending you an email indicates that a phone call is not necessary. If she wanted to talk to you on the phone, she would have returned your call.</p>
<p>So, to echo others’ advice: it is time for you to breathe a sigh of relief that this is settled, and move on!</p>
<p>There’s no way to make this “right” with A. You can’t go back there and they don’t want to talk to you. I think it’s over.</p>
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<p>The letter was something my Career Office approved, so it would seem that they thought was nice enough. (I’ve never had any experience with these kinds of letters, so I won’t comment on it) </p>
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<p>Career office held the same opinion. But my phone was on airplane mode when she replied to my e-mail. </p>
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<p>Is there a possibility I can go back to A for long-term employment, say, 15 to 20 years from now? I find that A is very laid-back, something I would want later on in the future. (not the high-intensity life in SV)</p>
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<p>The guy is brilliant, loads of patents, and his work is somewhat foundational to our group. Every big company has these somewhat temperamental types that are star performers and they know it and we really can’t afford for him to work for the competition.</p>
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<p>Many of the large SV companies have engineering subsidiaries around the country where the pace may be more laid back, the cost of living lower but the work just as interesting. If you want something slower, migrate to one of these larger companies in a quieter spot. That’s the type of place that I work in.</p>
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<p>Oh that’s good. I don’t want to live in the SV/CA area my entire life. Standard of living is exorbitantly high.</p>
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There’s a possibility you could go to work with them when you graduate. It’s hard to say whether you burned a bridge or not. As far as 15-20 years form now goes - I doubt they’d have any idea about this internship issue then or even if they did, that they’d care. There’s a difference between a 30 something y/o person with with 13-18 years of working experience applying for a job and a 19 y/o dealing with their first internship.</p>
<p>bceagle - yeah, sometimes you need to take the quirks with rest of it. If it was a more ‘normal’ employee I assume they would have fired him - I would have.</p>
<p>One firm which D1 turned down for internship last summer called her in Aug for an “alumni event.” D1 showed up expected to do some networking with people from her school. It turned out to be a cozy affair, 4 alums from the firm and D1. It was low key, but they encouraged her to consider their firm again when it came time to apply for permanent position. </p>
<p>The point is most firms do not hold a grudge just because you turned them down, if you do it professionally. They understand a good candidate will often have many options, and they compete for those candidates.</p>
<p>OP - you have done all you could under the circumstance. As other posters have said, it is time to move on. Good luck with your internship. Try to work on your decision making ability.:)</p>