|
swenblack posted:In my line of work, internships are basically a way of screening talent. We just hired our paid intern from two years ago because she is awesome. She never even looked for other jobs and she had a guaranteed job the day after she graduated with relocation expenses, industry standard pay, and decent benefits. In exchange for about $10k up front, I got a team member who I can guarantee gets along with everyone and is highly motivated. It's hard to see the down side, especially compared to the nightmare scenario of a bad hire. Maybe it's just my personal experience but whenever I've worked with interns they've been more of a burden than anything else. (that includes me when I was interning.) The value seems to flow one-way to the intern, not the team. They were like an entry level employee except they didn't really care and weren't in it for the long haul (which is not something I blame them for.) Thus on our teams we just did the babysitting and teaching without actually getting a colleague who grew into the role. And so I think it's not really "free" even if it's unpaid. That once in a while you got the "future great employee" is why I imagined the companies ran the program in the first place. This is in the tech world though, and only my personal experience; it's probably different in certain industries or even at certain tech companies. Frankly you often learn more in a good internship than much of college so it boggles my mind that people consider paying $200,000 for a college education "worth it" but an unpaid internship is "slavery". FieryBalrog fucked around with this message at 16:36 on May 21, 2014 |
#
?
May 21, 2014 16:32
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 25, 2024 05:37 |
|
|
My department just got word that we're getting a summer intern starting next week. This month has been super slow so we're sitting around doing nothing 75% of the time anyway. This is going to be a valuable experience for him.
|
|
#
?
May 21, 2014 16:49
|
|
|
mishaq posted:Do you not know what an intern is? "Won't stick around?" "Only talk about how the job benefits THEM in the cover letter?" Main Paineframe posted:Internships are only supposed to be good for THEM. In fact, in the private market, it's literally required that the internship only provides something for the employee, and nothing at all for the employer. I know that as a DC nonprofit, your company is exempt from those rules, but that kind of thing is why you come off as tone deaf and get people's hackles up when you complain about how those selfish unpaid workers are only thinking of themselves and THEIR needs when they offer to work for free for you. I think you'd really like me if you just gave me a chance! Yes, actually, sticking around is kind of important. This is why I prefer to hire people that are currently in school - they aren't generally looking for full time employment and so will stay through the term. An intern that leaves mid-way through, while I totally understand (I provided a good reference for an intern that had only started for me a month ago, and then immediately left after landing the job, screwing myself over in the process) totally defeats the point of having an intern. I lose the time spent training them. I also don't like to hire as unpaid interns people long out of school because they should be applying for jobs, not internships. It makes me sad when we have people who take an internship with us and when I ask why they say because they haven't been able to find work and don't want gaps in their resume. As far as cover letters go, have you ever applied to a job before? Did your cover letter talk entirely about how great the job would be for you? Applying for an internship is just like applying for a job. I'm confused why this is controversial for me to say. I don't think its selfish of them, just bad cover letter writing. You'll never get a job writing like that, and you'll never get an internship either, even if the internship is supposed to benefit them. Non profit internships/DC internships are so different from for-profit internships, it is really kind of useless comparing them. Yes, our interns are like unpaid full time employees. No, I don't think that's fair (see my original post). We could do things differently, but only by radically changing what we study and focus on - we don't have the resources to do what we do without interns. I do think that the ready availability of people that will work for free has pernicious impacts on the DC labor market, driving down starting salaries and creating organizations that exist on the backs of unpaid people. I think I've written before in this thread that I would be strongly in favor of reform in the system of unpaid internships for non-profits, somehow restricting them to only current students or within 1 year of graduation or something like that. I am pushing to establish stipends/minimum wage for our own interns here. I'm incredibly sympathetic to the issues that face unpaid interns, having been one myself. I hope you don't think I'm "tone deaf" just because I say that you should apply to an internship like you apply for a job? I'm the ones reviewing the applications and I have friends in similar positions. That's just advice. You can ignore it and see what happens I guess.
|
|
#
?
May 28, 2014 18:18
|
|
|
There was a story about the interns where I work on our internet today. It stated we had 189 summer interns and that 4670 has applied for those 189 positions. Pretty crazy for sure.
|
|
#
?
Aug 27, 2014 19:49
|
|
|
So I'm currently in the process of firing all my employees and replacing them with unpaid interns, and I have a quick question in how beys to break the news. Any advice?
|
|
#
?
Aug 28, 2014 18:28
|
|
|
Professor Tomtom posted:So I'm currently in the process of firing all my employees and replacing them with unpaid interns, and I have a quick question in how beys to break the news. Any advice? "Hey, guys. Good news! You get to help the company meet its cash flow goals!"
|
|
#
?
Aug 28, 2014 21:46
|
|
|
I am pretty sure you are joking but basically what you are thinking about doing would be illegal since an unpaid worker can't do any work other than replicating work of a paid employee in the private sector.
|
|
#
?
Aug 28, 2014 22:56
|
|
|
Professor Tomtom posted:So I'm currently in the process of firing all my employees and replacing them with unpaid interns, and I have a quick question in how beys to break the news. Any advice? Offer your employees a new job, as an unpaid intern.
|
|
#
?
Aug 29, 2014 02:31
|
|
|
Got offered a full time position today after being a (paid) intern for the past summer. My internship was marketed as a 12 week interview though, and was paid very appropriately for the position. When used this way, internships are very very helpful for both company and employee.
|
|
#
?
Aug 29, 2014 02:36
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 25, 2024 05:37 |
|
|
Quandary posted:Got offered a full time position today after being a (paid) intern for the past summer. My internship was marketed as a 12 week interview though, and was paid very appropriately for the position. When used this way, internships are very very helpful for both company and employee. Me too!  
|
|
#
?
Sep 1, 2014 05:01
|
|
