10 Intern Management Tips from My Former Interns

May 6, 2022

Interns are a staple in the MayeCreate company culture.  I find myself encouraging more and more of my clients to hire an intern to help with their marketing efforts, though many are leery, not knowing where to find an intern with the necessary skills and interests or not knowing which tasks interns are capable of handling.

But finding and hiring an intern is only half the battle… you actually have to train them and manage them to get any sort of great work out of them! Because interns are seeking an experience, and an entry-level experience at that, you have a big responsibility to help them have an experience that builds their career and teaches them how to be great employees.

We have had many, many interns over the last 17 years at MayeCreate. Some of them have been terrible, and others have been amazing. One of them still works for us to this day. They’re good, they’re bad, they’re everything in between… The only thing you can manage is how you manage them.

So I’m going to give you 10 intern management tips from my former interns. Yep, that’s right – intern management tips from interns! They actually wrote all of these tips for me so I could share them with you.

1. Make sure your intern’s work area is ready when he or she arrives for work. 
   Example: If you plan on providing a desk for your new intern, then make sure it is cleared off and prepped for their work with office supplies.
2. List out intern tasks and responsibilities. 
   Example: Tasks and responsibilities can include filing, beta testing, social media maintenance, blog writing, analyze and compile data, research, etc.   
3. Create process documents or training videos to clearly explain the tasks at hand.  This makes onboarding go much faster. 
   Example: Here at MayeCreate, we have a process document for everything, from how to write a blog post to taking a website live.
4. Have interns set goals and share expectations of what he or she wants to gain from the internship and, then set your goals and share expectations for the interns. 
   Example: If your goal for interns is to establish an online presence for a social media account, then share that with them right off of the bat! It is also nice to be aware of what your interns would like to accomplish during their internship.
5. Make sure new hires understand the office environment and everyone’s roles. 
   Example: Beginning an internship in a new environment can be a bit intimidating; give them a tour of your office and introduce them to the other employees.
6. Check in early and often, even micromanage a bit more than a normal employee at first, remember he or she is settling into the workforce. 
   Example: Walk hand in hand through one of the intern’s responsibilities, that way they will know exactly what you expect from them.  
7. Train on how to manage day-to-day activities. Attending school, juggling a part-time job and homework still, doesn’t prepare people to manage their day in an office. 
   Example: Provide your intern with a desk calendar or a pocket planner and demonstrate how he or she should schedule tasks and meetings.
8. Anticipate a learning curve, point out the things your intern does well and areas for improvement. 
   Example: The first couple of assignments from your interns will be rough, but after you give them constructive criticism, they will produce better work that is more pleasing to your liking.
9. Keep daily tasks or projects specific. Try not to make them juggle as much as a full-time employee.  Your intern’s time is limited and it’s likely he or she doesn’t have a fully developed skill set for problem-solving in your work environment. Those skills build with experience. 
   Example: Don’t ask for an article about the Olympics when you really want an article about the U.S. Olympic standing in the overall medal count.
10. When hiring for school year interns consider onboarding during the summer when they have fewer distractions and keep them on throughout the school year. 
    Example: Students are typically free in the summer in comparison to 15 hours of school work during the semesters, therefore summers are great for training.

This list is a great example of something an intern can do for your organization really, really well; they can help you see things from a different perspective, because they have a different perspective. They haven’t been in your organization forever, they don’t know how things are done and they haven’t been in the workforce forever. They are a younger generation who can help us see things with new eyes, so they can bring a lot of great things to your team.

If you’re on the fence about hiring an intern, hop back over to my episode titled “Hiring a Marketing Intern – What They’re Good For and Where to Find Them”. It will give you the ins and outs of what I really feel like an intern can do well for your organization. It will also talk about when you should NOT hire an intern. Last but not least, I talk about where you can find the interns in your community.