Internship Programs are an excellent opportunity created by companies for interns to develop their skills by working on real time projects. They learn how to work in an actual workplace, along with other teams, peers, managers and rest of the staff. Internship Programs offer students career alignment and training that helps them in their career progression.

Companies follow these programs because somewhere down the line they wish to convert the interns to full time employees. They even pay the interns. To create and follow a great internship program not only benefits the interns, but the company as well. It increases the overall productivity leading to successful goal accomplishment.

The article below will give you an insight into some of the best practices you can follow for an amazing Internship Program for your interns.
1.    Comprehensive Induction for All: Set up a full-fledged Induction and Orientation Program for the new comer Interns as well as their mentors. It’s important that everyone is on the same level of understanding as to what is expected out of them and their job roles. Once they are aware of their defined roles, it will get better in the longer run.

2.    Handy Protocols: Interns usually don’t know their way around the work place. So create a handbook or online document that will help them peruse the policies, protocols and decorum of the company. It should contain all the basics like their working hours, leisure time, organisation structure, leave policy, the FAQs of policies of the company. Once they gel well, invite them for their inputs to make the protocols even better. This will help them feel welcomed.

3.    Don’t make them slog: Interns won't have too much work like the full-time team members. They will be under training and might work on small level start to finish projects that may or may not require a rigorous routine. So it's not sensible to ask them to stay back without any reason, and make them work on unnecessary stuff. Most interns report to office while completing their college, so make it flexible for them to be able to tend to their studies while getting trained. Alternatively, companies can increase their working hours on weekends for extra sessions, and keep the week days a little relaxed.

4.    Involve them: If you want your interns to turn into full-time employees, its quite obvious that you involve them with rest of the team members. It's important for them to blend in with their co-workers and understand the work culture. Pick a few volunteers from the mainstream team, and they can have corporate events, hackathons, other professional events with the help of these interns.

5.    Continuous Evaluation: Evaluate them, regularly. After all, interns are young people who can go astray pretty quickly. It’s important to make them aware of the criticality and importance of their presence at the company. Hold periodic tests in the form of group discussions, have them give demo for small topics, have contests, go traditional and have written tests, have them work on week-long projects to prove themselves regularly. This will give you a clear idea of who’s worth keeping and who’s not.

6.    Offer Scholarships: A lot of companies offer scholarships to interns who do their job really well, prove to be smart and interested in progressing their career, who are quick, and understand the dynamics of the system. Introduce scholarships for interns for getting better talent on board. This will increase your brand value as well, so curate this very carefully. Make sure the scholarships are truly benefitting for the deserving interns.

7.    Give them Real Work: Of course, they will make coffee if needed, but that’s not what you have hired them for, right? Provide them real projects to work on. Internships are for them to learn skills that are helpful to them in their future. Let them work with the team and understand how the work process is managed. The mentor will play major role while training as well as assigning them with work that helps not just the interns but the company too. They must realize that they are also a contributing factor.

8.    Appreciate them: Even though they have not gone live with big clients or projects, they are still working on a lot of things that otherwise may or may not be done with the required proficiency. Appreciate them when you see they have done a great job. Keep a small prize to help them stay motivated to do better. Even if they work with you for 6 months, respect their contribution to your company and reward them accordingly.

Internship Programs, if curated carefully are a great way to connect with good talent and absorb them into the team to achieve the desired success. It also helps create your brand value in the market.

People recognise you for the perks your interns get which in turn regulates more traffic towards the organisation. Achieving your goals will become easier when you strive to make their lives better by training them, teaching them, and utilising them in the best possible manner.

Do you have any more tips to share? Please feel free to reach us at employability@internwise.com.