How Internship Programs Help Employers Hire the Best

There are plenty of useful reasons to have an internship program at your company: It will help you hire more Generation Yers, it’s a great way to evaluate possible employees before you hire them, students bring fresh outlooks and new ideas to the table, it’s a good way to give back to your local community, etc.

But one of the main reasons having an internship program at your company is useful is because internship programs can help you hire the best talent, since many internships turn into full-time job opportunities.

In fact, creating an internship program is one of the most effective ways for you to hire the best talent because you are training the interns based on your company’s policies, procedures, mission and culture, which will help shape them into the kind of employees you want working full-time for your company.

If you view interns as a group of pre-professionals you can mold, and you actually coach and develop them, you’ll never run out of great people to hire.

Coaching is the process of giving people the tools, knowledge and opportunities they need to develop themselves and become more effective.

Here are four steps you can take to develop your interns into employees you want to hire:

Set Goals—Even though interns aren’t full-time employees, it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t still treat them like employees. Interns are there to learn, so why not help them become the best employee they can possibly be by setting goals with them at the beginning of their internship that they’d like to accomplish by the end of their internship. Goals can be anything that are career-related and attainable in the amount of time the intern will be working for your company.
Give Consistent, Constructive Feedback—Since interns are still learning, and since most internships are a student’s first experience in the working world, it’s a good idea to provide them with consistent, constructive feedback on the work they’re doing. Give them feedback often (whenever they complete an assignment, if possible), and make sure your feedback is in alignment with the goals the intern is trying to reach. By telling them what they’re doing well and what they need to work on, you are helping them develop the skills they need to be successful in the workplace.
Provide Learning Opportunities—Interns are participating in the internship at your company to gain a learning experience, but you can also supplement their learning by offering training opportunities that go above and beyond what they would normally learn from your program. Learning opportunities can include training on different computer programs that will help them get their work done more effectively, training on resume writing and job interviewing so they can get a good job, etc. The more you train and develop your interns, the more they’ll become employees with the skill set you’d like to hire.
Weekly Meetings—Although sometimes things get so busy weekly meetings are impossible, it’s still a good idea to meet with your interns as often as you can to see where they are in their learning. Encourage them to share their questions, concerns, opinions and ideas with you. If you use your weekly meetings as coaching sessions, you’ll see a change in the intern from when they start to when they finish.

Being an approachable, active listener will help you coach and develop your interns. And the best thing about interns is that they usually don’t have a lot of work experience, so by giving them coaching, you can mold them into the type of employee you’d like to have working at your company.

They are there for a learning experience, so why not give it to them?

Stay tuned to my blog...in the coming weeks, I'll be posting a blog about creating an internship program, along with a link to a free, downloadable eduGuide that will teach you everything you need to know to create a successful program at your company.

Created by: Jennifer Blanchard
Last Modified On: 9/30/2008 11:18:18 AM

How Internship Programs Help Employers Hire the Best

If you view interns as a group of pre-professionals you can mold, and you actually coach and develop them, you’ll never run out of great people to hire.

Coaching is the process of giving people the tools, knowledge and opportunities they need to develop themselves and become more effective.

Here are four steps you can take to develop your interns into employees you want to hire:

Set Goals—Even though interns aren’t full-time employees, it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t still treat them like employees. Interns are there to learn, so why not help them become the best employee they can possibly be by setting goals with them at the beginning of their internship that they’d like to accomplish by the end of their internship. Goals can be anything that are career-related and attainable in the amount of time the intern will be working for your company.
Give Consistent, Constructive Feedback—Since interns are still learning, and since most internships are a student’s first experience in the working world, it’s a good idea to provide them with consistent, constructive feedback on the work they’re doing. Give them feedback often (whenever they complete an assignment, if possible), and make sure your feedback is in alignment with the goals the intern is trying to reach. By telling them what they’re doing well and what they need to work on, you are helping them develop the skills they need to be successful in the workplace.
Provide Learning Opportunities—Interns are participating in the internship at your company to gain a learning experience, but you can also supplement their learning by offering training opportunities that go above and beyond what they would normally learn from your program. Learning opportunities can include training on different computer programs that will help them get their work done more effectively, training on resume writing and job interviewing so they can get a good job, etc. The more you train and develop your interns, the more they’ll become employees with the skill set you’d like to hire.
Weekly Meetings—Although sometimes things get so busy weekly meetings are impossible, it’s still a good idea to meet with your interns as often as you can to see where they are in their learning. Encourage them to share their questions, concerns, opinions and ideas with you. If you use your weekly meetings as coaching sessions, you’ll see a change in the intern from when they start to when they finish.

They are there for a learning experience, so why not give it to them?

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