With so many new things in the works over here at BookFresh, we thought it would be a good idea to get some extra help. With many students on summer break and recent grads still looking for full-time work, summer interns were the perfect solution!
For many small businesses, hiring full-time extra help is uneconomical and time-consuming. Many successful businesses have learned the value in summer interns. With many college and graduate students eager to build their resumes with real-world business experience, finding the perfect intern for your business may be easier than you thought.
As we embarked on our mission to find the best and brightest young minds, we learned a few valuable tips to hiring and managing interns.
Create an “Intern Responsibilities” List
Interns can be a major help in many large-scale projects your business has. Create a list of the major tasks you may need help with in the immediate future as well as those you are keeping on the back-burner. A few tasks an intern can help with are (prospective customer leads, updating websites, help plan events, assist with human resource issues/projects)
Post Your Internship
Widen the pool of interns to choose from by posting your internship needs on websites such as Craigslist or Internships.com. Some of these sites allow you to post for free and other require a small fee. Career offices at local universities and colleges are a great place to post internships. Many career offices have advisors that well help match internship postings with the most suitable student candidate.
Create Structure
Once you have found our perfect intern, it is very important to create structure and provide guidance. For many interns, this experience may be their first in the business world. Clear expectations, deadlines, and guidance will create a mutually beneficial internship.