AIBU to want to push this intern out of the window

[Rosamund1]

I've got nice shoes older than he is but that's not why I am annoyed.

He is the son of one of the owners friends and he will finish uni next year. This is a small firm so excellent opportunity to get some experience.

I am looking after him and to get him started I asked him to write a couple of pages of the impact a change of legislation may have on our clients. I gave him a full day to produce something. I told him that I acknowledge that at uni you may have days or weeks to write and research, but on the ground clients want answers quickly so it was an excercise in speed as well as content. At the end of the day he said he's not ready. And the next day. FFS.

Then I asked him for a list of for example dentists in a five mile radius because we are going to write to them. A whole day later he produces a handwritten list. My local dentist is not on the list. I told him that the job is not glamorous, there is a lot of admin.

Next, we are having a meeting with a big client. I said he could sit in on the presentation. As preparation please read the file and prepare a one page summary of the background, clients needs & where we are to date. He didn't do it. He just attended the meeting, no prep. Obviously he would not be presenting but come on.

He is scruffy and he mumbles instead of talking. He gives the impression he does not want to be here - forced by parents perhaps. I have looked after other interns before but none like this.

Sometimes I walk past his screen and he has some random internet page open. I ask if he has anything to do and he says no. I told him at the beginning that we can't babysit him, if he is at a loose end he can ask anyone in the team for something.

I'm not going to point out his general lack of interest and uselessness to the boss, who is his mum's friend. I am not going to stick my neck out and say 'You need to stand up straight, tuck your shirt in and look lively.' I will just memorise his name and try and avoid him in a professional context. Or just push him out the window.

'if he is at a loose end he can ask anyone for something' is far too vague. When you start a job you don't know what peoples roles are, forget their names, and haven't a clue what to ask.

I wouldn't throw this intern out the window OP. It comes across that you have a downer on him/her just because he/she is the son of a colleague's friend. This is irrelevant imo. He/she is still a human being you know. And actually, if you rate your colleague, he/she is probably perfectly OK as a human being, just green and ignorant. With rather vague and irritated supervision he is unlikely to progress.

I might go in a different direction than most but sometimes a soft approach may work wonders. Don't play the hard-core busy professional who has no time for his shit.
Chances are he's been taught that his parents' money will sort out all problems and never even had to get the proper skills to do a job. A decent person who shows trust, patience and takes a bit of extra time may be a game changer for him. He may not be a total moron, you didn't say he gives the impression of overentitlednicitis, he simply may be completely ignorant because he never had to work for money. Given a chance, he may change.

With rather vague and irritated supervision he is unlikely to progress.

This.
A corporate fucking John Wayne swaggering around like the CEOs left hand doesn't make for a proper supervisor but that's exactly how the OP and some posters sound like on this thread. The world of business could be a more pleasant place if people would actually show some proper leadership skills and stopped behaving like a cheap Trump imitation.

The OP doesn't sound like that at all.

How utterly hyperbolic and ridiculous.

I just read her first post again. The OP has told this person exactly what is expected, and he hasn't done it.

If anyone on this thread expects an intern to get more hand-holding than this in a busy office, they are deluded.

This generation have been through an overly structured sixth form and university system and are lost on their own as well as having unrealistic expectations
Yes, very true.

I think small talk - making conversation with people you don't know or have much in common with - is quite a sophisticated skill. You learn but it doesn't come naturally. Lots of young people spend so long in education, with mostly only people their own age, that they don't get chance to learn until they hit the workplace.

Sorry I was skim reading the last page and didn't see that funny had just made the same point.

Just another recommendation for the Social Mobility Foundation. Other types of support they offer are working with 6th formers on community projects of their choice (lots of great and stressed kids, some supportive schools and some school admin and teachers who were a nightmare), also email mentoring of 6th form students, which is a great way to volunteer if you can't get time to go anywhere, and also commenting on Personal Statements for university applications.

It's really great helping students apply for courses that are much more likely to satisfy them and lead to good jobs than the ones they first thought of.

Window is a good option. My intern leaves on Friday. She is amazing. I will be on my knees crying without her she's worked and tried so hard. Give him a shove.

I had several years of supervising interns and new grads in an international organisation. They were all supremely academically well-qualified, and the majority were arrogant, with unrealistic aspirations of the work they would be doing.

I found I just had to be straight with them, about what we expected of them, and how they conducted themselves, how they fitted into the team, and what other people were working on. I also really actively supervised initial tasks until I was sure they knew what they were doing and could give them more demanding work.

The problem is that no one else will do this for them - their university lecturer is pretty removed from the world of work, parents tend to think the very best if their children. Unless they pick this up by observing others behaviour (which a hefty portion do), you just have to set it out really clearly.

IME the best candidates are able to secure paid internships (we offer only paid, no unpaid internships)

Leaving unpaid internships only for weaker candidates.

We don't offer them because we believe they are discriminatory, and impede social mobility. So forgive me if I have a downer on companies that do.

How does offering someone an unpaid internship 'impede social mobility'?

(Presuming a small business that can't afford to pay interns, and a student needing experience.)

That may be why we've been so lucky until this year Queen - it's also why I find it so frustrating that our current intern is being a lazy layabout when so many people would kill for a well paid job...

How does offering someone an unpaid internship 'impede social mobility'?

Because only people from a family who can support them while they have this unpaid experience can benefit. A young person who needs to earn their keep might have to spend the summer waiting tables or stacking shelves instead of gaining what could be valuable professional experience to put on their CV.

Queen there are quite a few different types of internship, some of which are unpaid, always, regardless of the strength / character of the candidates.

They exist to serve completely different needs. Insisting they are all paid would mean that many internships simply would not happen, to the detriment of all concerned.

Making absolute statements about nepotism, class and privilege misses the point of some internships. So forgive me if I have a downer on posters who don't / won't understand or acknowledge that!

As it's at least possible to get a week or even a fortnight paid off a lot of jobs, I think unpaid internships for that length of time are potentially accessible.

You're kidding, anna? A student doing washing up or coffee-making for 8 weeks in the summer would get a paid holiday?

They impede social mobility because poorer students who need to earn in the holidays or can't afford rent on a house away from home can't apply for them. I see plenty of wealthy students living in Daddy's weekday city bolt-hole taking on unpaid internships. Not so many daughters of bus-drivers.

Blanche fortunately, on this one thing, the government actually agrees with me (actually, I think it's EU law), and has made it illegal to employ unpaid interns (and I classify an internship as actually doing a job that gives you proper experience in the sector, to add to your CV) except in very specific circumstances.

Someone spending 2 weeks in the office in the summer isn't an intern. They are there on work-experience and should not be expected to carry out any work.

We employ over 100 interns per year in my office. All of whom get paid the same wage as our graduate trainees. Some of them are amazing. I particularly have my eye one of them for a full time role after she graduates - she's the daughter of a cleaner, from Glasgow, and it is absolutely clear that if this internship was unpaid, she would not have been able to do it.

yes WA1 - was just going to ask if this was him!

www.gov.uk/employment-rights-for-interns

fortunately, on this one thing, the government actually agrees with me (actually, I think it's EU law), and has made it illegal to employ unpaid interns (and I classify an internship as actually doing a job that gives you proper experience in the sector, to add to your CV) except in very specific circumstances.

Actually the government does not agree with you. I posted the above link a couple of pages ago. There both paid and unpaid internships.... you may class an internship as actually doing a job etc, but the government allow for other types... it may be a matter of 'what's in a name' but, nonetheless, there are legal unpaid internships!

Yes, Blanche, that's why I said in "except in specific circumstances". They are quite precise about what those circumstances are. The only exceptions are (lifted from your link):

"When interns aren’t due the National Minimum Wage
Student internships
Students required to do an internship for less than one year as part of a UK-based further or higher education course aren’t entitled to the National Minimum Wage.

School work experience placements
Work experience students of compulsory school age, ie under 16, aren’t entitled to the minimum wage.

Voluntary workers
Workers aren’t entitled to the minimum wage if both of the following apply:
they’re working for a charity, voluntary organisation, associated fund raising body or a statutory body
they don’t get paid, except for limited benefits (eg reasonable travel or lunch expenses)

Work shadowing
The employer doesn’t have to pay the minimum wage if an internship only involves shadowing an employee, ie no work is carried out by the intern and they are only observing."

Otherwise, they are due the NMW.

The girl from who emailed me saying "I don't appear to have been invited to interview. Hello? Surely some mistake? Which bit of Double First from Cambridge did you not understand?"

I'm howling!!

I mean, like, HELLOOOOOOO

I just read her first post again. The OP has told this person exactly what is expected, and he hasn't done it.

Agreed! OP sounds like she has been very clear and helpful with him.

I think it would be useful to sit down and have a 'performance meeting' with him to see how he has been finding it, what he has enjoyed/not enjoyed and ask why he wasn't able to complete the tasks in the time frame. Also a bit of a chat about how important it is to prepare for meetings.

I do think that internships shoudl be paid - unpaid internships make the profession the preserve of the rich e.g. journalist, publishing, fashion. Only the rich can afford to work all summer (or all year after graduating!) for free.