Anonymous wrote:Sorry the interns aren't as perfect as you were, op.

This is the greatest burden of your life.

Parenting the kids you failed to appropriately raise is a societal burden.

The being late and having a poor attitude are one thing, but getting on a kid about not knowing something is ridiculous.

Yes, they could google, but maybe they thought they were doing it right. If this is your attitude, maybe they are too scared of you to ask questions.

If you don’t want to teach interns, don’t hire them. The best mentors are the ones who are willing to hear the stupid questions!

Not to mention these are same people who will probably be showing you how to use whatever the new version of AI is in 20 years. Do you really want them to treat you like dirt because of what you don’t know?

I’d be concerned if they couldn’t just google how to address an envelope. Even my 80 year old mom knows to google stuff she doesn’t know how to do.

How are some of you defending putting a letter in the outgoing mail with no address. This screams that they have no common sense. OP didn’t say they put the address in the wrong place, that could be corrected. They left it blank. I would have an issue with that too.

There is no excuse for being late or asking for days off either. They must have never played sports, had a job or real volunteer commitment or any actual responsibility before.

My DH is on the intern hiring committee at his company. They no longer consider applicants without a work history. A student’s first job experience shouldn’t be an internship at age 20/21. He said that the most successful applicants have had regular teen jobs in the summer and/or the school year.

My DS is a junior and college and even though he’s a B student, he’s gotten multiple internship offers for the summer. One hiring manager said the committee was impressed by my son’s former boss’s recommendation.

Sorry the interns aren't as perfect as you were, op.

This is the greatest burden of your life.

Some of this sounds like a hiring issue. Did your organization not ask about whether the interns had experience doing the things you require?

Anonymous wrote:I’ve been a professional for over 20 years and I have never once had to mail a letter for work.

So? The point interns do have to mail letters, clearly don’t know how, and don’t bother to figure it out. I’m sure OP wouldn’t be so harsh if the intern came up and asked if they did it correctly, googled it but just wanted to verify it was correct, or flat out ask how to do it. I have have zero problem answers the questions of the young or new employees/interns. I will happily offer any guidance I have on the most trivial things. However, they do need to show some initiative to get their tasks completed and do to them correctly.

Ok

Anonymous wrote:So one of the things I appreciated about my two older kids’ first jobs was that the staff mentored them. As a parent, you can teach your kids a lot of things. But generalizing things to a different environment doesn’t come easily for all kids. I can recall instances where my kids shared things they “learned” at work that they actually already knew but hadn’t applied to this new setting. I always felt like their mentors were kind yet forceful about conveying expectations. And, as someone who hires young people into what might be their first job, it’s OP’s responsibility to be a mentor. After all, in exchange for the free or cheap labor, internships are to teach students about the workplace.

+1

Honestly I think OP sounds lazy and entitled.

I’ve been a professional for over 20 years and I have never once had to mail a letter for work.

So one of the things I appreciated about my two older kids’ first jobs was that the staff mentored them. As a parent, you can teach your kids a lot of things. But generalizing things to a different environment doesn’t come easily for all kids. I can recall instances where my kids shared things they “learned” at work that they actually already knew but hadn’t applied to this new setting. I always felt like their mentors were kind yet forceful about conveying expectations. And, as someone who hires young people into what might be their first job, it’s OP’s responsibility to be a mentor. After all, in exchange for the free or cheap labor, internships are to teach students about the workplace.

Anonymous wrote:This is OP again. I didn't give a bad reference. What I said is that it was hard to write a positive one.

I am bothered by the fact that this intern didn't know that what they did was wrong. They didn't ask someone for help, didn't get on youtube, just thought they had accomplished the task and put it in the outgoing mail to be picked up. I guess they though someone could devine where the mail was destined.

This kid is one of many doing similar stuff. I thought I would share because I realized my kids would be viewed similarly unless I did something.

Ok, the whole letter things is just a symptom of the bigger issue that there wasn't any time taken to try to figure out the correct way to handle the problem. That's fair. But, maybe they didn't think it was a problem - I'm a Dad of intern age kids - one a HS junior and another a college soph. I just did a volunteer event at work for our local SPCA were we had to sort vaccination forms and them stuff them in envelops, address and stamp. I did have to remind one of my young coworkers how to properly address an envelop after the first couple weren't correct. Things change. Heck, put a rotary phone in front of them and they'll be stumped.

But, overall, I agree with your overall statement. Show up on time, do the work, and ask for help if needed. FWIW, my son has had a part time job since he was 16. He shows up on time and doesn't randomly call off which is a lot more many of his coworkers.

Anonymous wrote:This is OP again. I didn't give a bad reference. What I said is that it was hard to write a positive one.

I am bothered by the fact that this intern didn't know that what they did was wrong. They didn't ask someone for help, didn't get on youtube, just thought they had accomplished the task and put it in the outgoing mail to be picked up. I guess they though someone could devine where the mail was destined.

This kid is one of many doing similar stuff. I thought I would share because I realized my kids would be viewed similarly unless I did something.

I understand and agree OP. it’s not the lack of skill it’s the lack of curiosity or acknowledgement that they can’t do something. I didn’t know how to use excel when I started my first after college job. I googled my way into proficiency. There was a lot let how to stuff on the internet then. You can find a video on YouTube for almost anything now.

Being on time and leaving after 5 pm is common sense. If they need to be taught that, they have much bigger problems they are tackling in life.
What I see if this calling in sick all the time and zero working memory.