Purpose of Interns

[Anonymous]

In a lot of fields, it's a long job interview. My kid is just starting a FT job on Wall Street after interning the last two summers. It never seemed like she was pulling her weight those last summers, but they did have her do things like reports and presentations that they could assess for quality.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If they just do ''busy work'' or work that has to be redone by full-time staff, what is the point of hiring interns?

Especially given companies are giving less return offers due to budget restraints

Having been an intern, projects aren’t always explained quite enough. Not for me to have done the task independently. Like if they had told me one more detail, it would have been fine.

And I sometimes had a question, but no one was available to answer.

Check in on interns more frequently. It’s not handholding, it’s communication.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In a lot of fields, it's a long job interview. My kid is just starting a FT job on Wall Street after interning the last two summers. It never seemed like she was pulling her weight those last summers, but they did have her do things like reports and presentations that they could assess for quality.

In private equity?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I mean if your job can be performed quite easily by an intern that doesn't say much for the work y'all are doing.

It can’t be performed, but it definitely can be helped. I am in research field and interns can help with gathering data etc.

[Anonymous]

In my experience, internships work best when you can assign them an independent, summer-long project that may or may not see the light of day, depending on how well it is done (and won’t create additional work for someone else if it is not done right). They are happy “owning” a somewhat meaningful project, they hopefully walk away with a work sample, and if they don’t execute, no one cares.

Identifying and managing this project takes a lot of work on the part of the intern manager though. I hate it when an intern is dropped on me because someone’s nephew needed resume content.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In my experience, internships work best when you can assign them an independent, summer-long project that may or may not see the light of day, depending on how well it is done (and won’t create additional work for someone else if it is not done right). They are happy “owning” a somewhat meaningful project, they hopefully walk away with a work sample, and if they don’t execute, no one cares.

Identifying and managing this project takes a lot of work on the part of the intern manager though. I hate it when an intern is dropped on me because someone’s nephew needed resume content.

+1

Just wait until the nephew applies for a job under you and you have to frantically but quietly stop your boss from making them your permanent problem

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In my experience, internships work best when you can assign them an independent, summer-long project that may or may not see the light of day, depending on how well it is done (and won’t create additional work for someone else if it is not done right). They are happy “owning” a somewhat meaningful project, they hopefully walk away with a work sample, and if they don’t execute, no one cares.

Identifying and managing this project takes a lot of work on the part of the intern manager though. I hate it when an intern is dropped on me because someone’s nephew needed resume content.

Absolutely this. And I always try to NOT hire the intern that’s the relative of a senior executive if I can help it, because there’s a lot of pressure and eyeballs on you if you do that. It’s actually a disadvantage in my opinion, although they always wind up getting hired.

To me, there should be a rule that you can’t get an internship at a fortune 500 if you’re a relative of someone who works there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No point in having them around now that we can't have sex with them.

Since when? What happened? Dear God, WTH happened?

Look but don't touch.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My intern is fine! 4.0 GPA and the project is moving forward with their inputs. Very knowledgeable and curious to learn and contribute.

So wtf are you guys talking about? I would not request an intern for fetching coffee. I need work power to get sh*t done.

Sounds like YOU hired YOUR intern. A lot of us get provided an intern (sometimes for a finite - less than the full term) to manage and configure into our teams. Some of us end up reacting to our interns instead of integrating our interns.

Almost like a PR driven activity versus finding new hires.

[Anonymous]

You can learn a lot just by being in the mix, especially if you aren’t burdened by having to put your head down all the time.

[Anonymous]

My company’s interns are paid and do real projects. We don’t have the budget for it currently, but in the past it was the best way to get hired with us if you perform well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In my experience, internships work best when you can assign them an independent, summer-long project that may or may not see the light of day, depending on how well it is done (and won’t create additional work for someone else if it is not done right). They are happy “owning” a somewhat meaningful project, they hopefully walk away with a work sample, and if they don’t execute, no one cares.

Identifying and managing this project takes a lot of work on the part of the intern manager though. I hate it when an intern is dropped on me because someone’s nephew needed resume content.

Absolutely this. And I always try to NOT hire the intern that’s the relative of a senior executive if I can help it, because there’s a lot of pressure and eyeballs on you if you do that. It’s actually a disadvantage in my opinion, although they always wind up getting hired.

To me, there should be a rule that you can’t get an internship at a fortune 500 if you’re a relative of someone who works there.

​You guys must be living under a rock. There are rules and there are ways to work around those rules. Those rules only apply to regular workers and not senior leadership. There are rules like that at my company, but I give those internships to my neighbor's kids, and they do the same for my kids. See how that works?