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Planning an IT Internship Program? Read This First!

In a challenging environment for sourcing and hiring technology professionals, your company needs to look at other channels to keep the talent pipeline flowing. Forging an IT internship program with local colleges and tech schools provides a great way to see how these emerging tech pros work as part of your team. It also gives your organization a chance to hire the best and brightest before the competition.

Here are a few best practices on building a technology internship program. Leverage these concepts to add another source of candidates to your company’s staffing process. It’s simply a great idea for the current job market and beyond.

Forge Partnerships With Local Educational Institutions

Of course, the obvious first step to any internship program is building partnerships with local universities, trade schools, and even high schools in your region. Partnering with educational institutions beyond your region also makes sense if you want to expand your company’s profile. Chris Drumgoole, CIO at GE, commented on their approach.

“This requires regular presence on campus through presentations or hack-a-thons as well as recruiting events. We also have a very successful program at the University of Cincinnati that started as a summer internship program and has evolved into a year-round program.  The initial focus was more project-based, but now has become focused on software and coding — allowing interns to create their own solutions and pitch those solutions to senior leaders for implementation across the organization,” said Drumgoole.

Get Executive Support for Internships

Your company’s executive team needs to see the advantages of a robust internship program. Help them understand how interns provide a great source of high-level technology talent to your organization. This approach gets them engaged about first investing in the program, but tangible results are still necessary.

As more interns become valued full-time employees, making a difference in real-world projects, these benefits will become obvious.

Use Interns on Actual Projects

You don’t start an internship program to have someone to make coffee or simply perform application builds. Put them to work on your actual projects; making them truly a part of the team.

Leveraging interns in this fashion offers the most benefits to your organization. They gain valuable professional experience to jumpstart their careers, while the company gets to see how they operate under pressure. Perhaps a job offer awaits them upon graduation?

If your organization needs help building a great tech team, talk with the experts at Venteon. As one of the top IT staffing agencies in Detroit, we provide top candidates able to help your business succeed. Schedule a meeting with us soon!

 

 

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