5 Action Points That Will Help Set Your Intern Up For Success

Image by: Brooke Cagle

After the selection process, your intern is ready to get to work, and so are you.

Your first steps are critical to ensure that the rules of engagement are set for everyone.

Communication and work style must be discussed to ensure learning and working are taking place concurrently.

The biggest stress point of a manager is ensuring full engagement from your recruit from the get-go.

Here are some tips to help you do that effectively even as you manage your busy schedule.

1. Take them on a Virtual tour

Show them around their new works space. Set up a virtual tour of the office, this makes them feel part of the team and shows them you value their experience.

2. Provide them with a checklist to follow

Another way to keep interns engaged is to provide checklists. Many students likely have never interned in a remote environment, so it’s important to provide extra resources to limit any uneasiness they have about this new experience.

The list can include the following: meet with your team, five tasks to be completed at the end of your internship, as well as a date and time for a one-on-one with your manager.

3. Set Weekly expectations

Setting expectations isn’t a one-time occurrence, set them at the beginning of the internship, and the beginning of every new project. These can include:

• Working hours. Let your interns know when they’re expected to check in every day, but be sure to keep time zones in mind.

• Meeting participation. Are your interns expected to participate in all-hands meetings? Are they responsible for scheduling meetings with their managers or anyone else that could assist them on a project? Make sure they are added to all regular meetings

• How we communicate. Some organizations communicate through emails while others almost exclusively use messaging apps, let your intern know so they don’t miss vital information or are confused about how to reach out to the team.

• Be explicit about response times and means of communication internally and externally.

You can use many different communication tools to stay in touch with your interns. Examples include Trello, Slack, Basecamp, Zoom, Go to Meeting, Google Hangouts, MS Office Teams, and Join.me, Skype, Google Calendar, DropBox, and Google Drive.

• Projects. Whether your intern will be working on multiple projects or one big capstone project, let them know their key deliverables, expectations on the final project, how to submit it, how you format documents or presentations, and how they will be evaluated.

By setting expectations with your interns early on, you’re letting them know that you genuinely care about their success with your organization. This also gives them the chance to ask questions to fully understand what their internship will look like.

4. Consistency is key

Communication is an essential part of any successful internship. Whether you’re engaging interns with status updates before your program begins, weekly check-ins throughout the program, or following up post-internship, communication keeps everything moving. Communicate consistently with your interns.

Key times to communicate in a project:

• Before each project begins

• During the project as you give a status update as you give your input

• set up checkpoint meetings to find out if the project is going ok

• post analysis meeting, this can happen once the project is done and you are sharing the outcomes

• Appraisal per project

5. Your culture is more than work and meetings

Perhaps one of the most important aspects of any internship is sharing your culture with your intern. This can be a big motivator in working for your company or being an advocate for your organization. When we think of culture, it’s most often in terms of in-office perks, our values, and our mission. Virtual interns, however, don’t get to experience culture in the office, so your virtual intern program must make culture front and center.

With so many collaboration platforms out there, creating a sense of culture has never been easier. Paired with a little creativity, you have the opportunity to show interns what it would be like to work with your company full-time. Here’s how,

• Include interns in company-wide meetings or virtual social gatherings.

• Host lunch and learns, team breakfasts, or coffee sessions where interns can interact with the team.

• Set up a time every week or so for the team to get together in an open space to ask questions and get to know each other.

• Show interns that you value their contributions by introducing them in a company blog post and showing off their final projects on your LinkedIn page or in another blog. This is a fun way for interns to share facts about themselves and for team members to get to know each other. You might also consider encouraging interns to participate in social media takeovers to introduce themselves or share what a day in the life of an intern is like.

• When your internship program ends, ask your intern to write a testimonial on your organization's social media pages

A remote internship can be overwhelming, but with a little bit of creativity and a plan, you can create an experience your intern will learn from while adding value to your organization

More resources to help manage conversations with your intern.

Listen: https://ronnyhu.wixsite.com/journalism/podcast

Read: https://www.hrmorning.com/articles/rules-of-engagement-keeping-your-interns-enthused-all-summer/

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Watch: https://youtu.be/4gSD18MhqRA

Email us at: talantalearning@talanta.com