How to Give Business Students A Business Internship Experience

For today’s best and brightest students, the learning experience goes well beyond the university classroom. Students with high ambitions and lofty career goals are often seeking meaningful internship experiences to gain firsthand experience in their field of interest. These students are eager to apply new ideas and concepts learned in the classroom and often seeking forward-thinking companies capable of providing an enriching experience. 

For companies considering a business-related internship for university students, it’s important to design a program that offers the next generation a valuable opportunity to listen, learn and lead. While internship programs can take on a variety of different models, some core concepts are common among all types of internship programs. 

To give you business students a meaningful internship experience:

Set specific goals for the intern and have a plan to provide accountability

A job description for any level of an internship is important and is just one step of the onboarding process. Once the intern has been hired and begins the temporary employment phase, make time to create specific, mutually beneficial goals. This step will allow the student to focus on actionable items and learn how to balance work assignments. 

Once the goals have been determined, schedule a time to meet with the student regularly to assess their progress toward each goal and offer resources for areas of improvement. 

Assign staff members as mentors to the interns

Most interns will have a direct supervisor to whom they will report daily. To offer a more beneficial experience, consider assigning a staff member as a mentor to the intern, as well. The staff member can be from a different department or division of the company and offer a unique perspective on company culture, learning experiences, and development. 

Go the extra mile by suggesting local attractions, cuisine, and cultural activities to enhance their stay.It can be difficult to be a student intern in a new city or brand-new environment. While the primary relationship between the company and the student will be a working relationship, the process can be enhanced by introducing the intern to local attractions, cuisine, and cultural activities. 

A pre-internship package can be sent that offers ideas on how to prepare for living in the area, special event dates, business attire expectations, etc. It is also extremely important to offer the university student housing options and inform them about student accommodation

Treat the interns as future employees and value their insight and perspective. 

It can be tempting for some companies to treat interns like just another pair of hands to help with filing, answering phone calls, and scheduling appointments. These are business tasks that must be done, however, by limiting an intern’s access to significant projects or processes, you are also shortchanging your own opportunity to see what they are truly capable of. 

Where possible, offer interns the chance to be a part of company decision-making, new client onboarding, and valuable company activities. Provide them with resources to develop special skills and understand how knowing their strengths and weaknesses can help them find a potential employer in the future. 

When you treat the interns as future employees, it changes your perspective about how you will train and teach them.

Schedule time to evaluate the internship after the term and use the feedback to inform future internship opportunities

Every intern is another opportunity to learn how to improve your company’s recruitment and management of university students. As the internship approaches its end, schedule time to evaluate how the internship went, assess final progress on learning goals and incorporate the feedback to make program adjustments for the future. 

Asking each intern to leave a note for a future internship, giving them their best advice or tips is a great way to build a network of future employees and cultivate the type of workplace culture the upcoming generation is seeking.