Virtual Recruiting And Onboarding Of Summer Interns

4 factors to consider

Summer internships are a right of passage for most college students. Not only do they allow students to get real-world experience in the field of expertise they are studying, but they also act as a resume builder. In many cases, interns who make a positive impression over the summer receive offers for full-time jobs after graduation. 

For businesses, internships are an excellent way to build their talent pipeline and secure promising, innovative candidates before they can be snatched up by competitors. Interns can bring new perspectives, produce innovative ideas and strengthen work culture.  
 

But this summer, internships are looking very different due to COVID-19. While some employers have canceled internships altogether, others still see value in continuing with their summer internship programs and have simply adjusted their programs to adapt to the current situation. According to the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE), 36 percent of employers report that their internship programs will go virtual this summer. Among these companies is software giant SAP, which hires about 3,000 interns globally each year. 

However, companies that decide to move forward with virtual internships can not afford to do what they have always done. In many cases, interns spend a good deal of time listening to and learning from multiple teams and individuals. This typically involves sitting in on client pitches, strategy meetings and creative brainstorm sessions - and interacting with different people across the organization, from department heads and senior managers to junior staff and even the leadership team. 

This is one of the more exciting elements of an internship for college students. Now that these in-person interactions will not be possible, some college students may be feeling hesitant about continuing with their internship in this new remote reality. As such, employers will have to change up how they recruit, onboard and engage interns from a distance. 

1. Change Your Recruitment Tactics: Tap into Virtual Career Fairs and Social Media 

College career fairs have long been a trusted avenue for recruiting interns. Companies set up booths, filled with recruitment materials, videos and staffers on-hand to talk about their company and its cultural values to college students in the hopes of enticing them to apply for an internship before they graduate. But that simply is not an option right now since all physical events have either been cancelled outright, postponed or moved online. 

An argument can be made for moving college career fairs online, as MIT recently did with its annual Spring Career Fair. For the first time ever on April 8, MIT’s career fair took place online. Interestingly, the sudden change to its normal way of running this event did not have such a negative impact on the success of the event. In fact, MIT was still able to attract 57 employer organizations and 472 MIT student and alumni participants to the event. For employers that are going full steam ahead with virtual internship programs, online career fair events should be a top priority and resource to attract promising college students. 

Social media is also an excellent way to reach and engage with potential interns. Remember, college students fall into the Gen Z category and are native users of technology and social media. This generation grew up during the most accelerated and game-changing periods of technological advancements in human history. They have had mobile devices in their hands since a very early age; they use 20+ apps a day, are highly skilled digital content creators and spend countless hours a day on social media sites like Instagram, TikTok and Snapchat. 

So now that traditional recruitment avenues are no longer an option, social media is a powerful way for employers to make themselves known and advertise their employer brand. 

Employers can reinvest the resources and budgets, which were previously allocated to sponsoring college career fairs, into a social media campaign that was designed to raise its employer branding profile and spark action from college students who would be an ideal fit for the summer internship program. For instance, if an employer is looking to recruit college students who are studying engineering, it can launch a user-generated content (UGC) campaign asking college students to showcase their coding skills in a creative video.

2: Get Internship Interviews on the Books Before Your Competitors 

Once a pipeline of internship candidates have been identified, then comes the fun part: the interviews. Of course, this now has to be done virtually due to social distancing rules. But this is where time is of the essence. The last thing you want to do is lose your top choice for an intern to a competitor - all because it took too long to confirm a meeting day and time that works for everyone. 

So how can recruiters get interviews in the books with potential interns, quickly and effortlessly? For one, they can use a scheduling technology platform that syncs with everyone’s calendars, allows everyone to vote on the preferred meeting day and time (across time zones) and automatically sends a calendar invite to everyone. 

3: Don’t Leave Interns Stranded on a Remote Island: Communicate Daily

Interns are typically young in age, lack formal work experience and crave ongoing guidance, direction and feedback from managers. This is all true in a traditional internship format, where students can actually be onsite and engage with managers, peers and leadership in person. So when internships go virtual, constant communication is so much more critical.

We recently surveyed HR professionals to find out how they are tackling virtual recruitment and onboarding. When we asked the surveyed respondents to cite their biggest challenge with onboarding remote employees, 17 percent said they struggle to provide remote workers with clarity and context about their role expectations and career growth. On top of that, 13 percent of the surveyed HR professionals admitted they find it difficult to establish communication norms with employees remotely. This could cause interns to feel stressed and anxious about their contribution to the company’s growth as well as how and where they fit into the community and culture.

If you look at these responses, it is clear that onboarding plays a major role in employee satisfaction, career development, fulfilment, engagement and retention. The same goes for interns, who could eventually become permanent employees and serve as brand ambassadors for the company. Employers should view these findings as an opportunity to forge stronger connections and relationships with their incoming interns.

The best way to alleviate these concerns - and help interns gain as much value from their internships as possible - is to provide frequent communication. According to a study by Yello, remote interns crave frequent communication with their hiring managers. In fact, 67 percent said they want to touch base daily, with a majority saying a 5-10 minute check in is fine along with a longer one-to-one meeting once a week. For most interns, being able to physically interact with managers, colleagues and leaders can go a long way in making them feel like part of the team and forge relationships with coworkers. 

4: Partner with Internal D&I, CSR and Culture Teams to Give Interns a Feel for the Company Culture 

Onboarding is not a one-and-done process. It is a lengthy process and involves communication and engagement with multiple stakeholders across the organization, including HR managers, onboarding specialists, payroll and benefits managers, hiring managers, department leads and the executive team. In many cases, onboarding can extend to an entire year. But if onboarding is not done right, it can cause some serious problems, including low employee morale and high turnover. 

Turnover is not a new problem for organizations. Early turnover, however, is even more troublesome, with 20 percent of employees leaving with their first 45 days of employment. 

As a recent Doodle study found, making remote workers feel like part of the team and integrating them into the company culture have proven difficult for 32 percent of HR teams. Now consider this: interns, who are part of Gen Z, have higher expectations and demands for an exceptional employee experience. And cultural fit plays an important role in that experience. If employers don’t master their virtual onboarding process for interns, they could see an increase in early turnover and worse yet, fewer acceptances of job offers extended to interns. And the culprit could very well be HR’s inability to virtually onboard new employees in a way that’s just as informative, interactive and engaging as it would be if it were conducted in-person. 

One way to make virtual onboarding a positive experience for interns this summer is to not put all your eggs into one basket. Rather than relying on the HR team to coordinate and provide all onboarding sessions, mix things up. Integrate people from the Diversity & Inclusion team, Corporate Social Responsibility team and Culture team - so that new interns can get a true feel and representation of the company’s cultural values, social responsibility programs and engagement activities. These are the teams who have their feet on the ground and are coming up with ideas, initiatives and activities that unify employees, foster a sense of community and empower employees to be their best selves. When interns can learn from these teams and even join their committees to build out CSR, D&I and culture programs, they will feel a stronger sense of fulfilment and loyalty to their employer.

Renato Profico is CEO of Doodle. A qualified executive with 20 years of professional experience in digital companies, he most recently held the position of CEO for four years at a leading job platform network in Switzerland, JobCloud. Connect Renato Profico