8 Tips to help Startups Hire and Manage Interns Better

Hiring and managing interns is like a double-edged sword. It can be rewarding and damaging simultaneously. It depends on how well the entrepreneur and office management uses them. In this article, we will highlight those crucial inside tricks that will guide you while hiring and how to manage interns at an early-stage startup:

1- Hiring an Intern?

1. Have a Clear Strategy in Mind

It’s great to have young guns at the table as a start-up, but that energy can misfire from your side if you aren’t sure about what you want the intern to do for you. To avoid such situations, have an accurate job description, mentioning roles and responsibilities for an intern, before hiring. Clear their doubts and, at the same time, make things clear before you further proceed.

2. Hire based on Skill rather than Resume

Assign a new task and see how they perform. It would be a good option to judge their capabilities as well as their commitment to the task. The certificate culture dominates internships, and the majority of students only join a company just because they want to join and work randomly. Still, they do not intend to work hard.

Be very selective while hiring interns. They are freshers, but that doesn’t mean you will compromise on quality, no matter how the work at hand seems urgent.

3. Don’t treat a part-time intern like a full-time one

If your intern is working only part-time, you should not make him/her the sole person in charge of customer service, fixing crucial bugs, or any other responsibilities that may require immediate attention. That means that if an intern has some other job to keep him or her busy or mid-terms to study for, then you can’t just expect him to be “on-call” whenever you need it. It would help if you also were mindful of giving extremely tedious tasks (like moving your car) to part-time interns because that’s not fair.

4. Have a Probation Period

The probation period is something most of the companies follow, some companies have three months, or some have six months probation period. The interns must match the work quality you expect. A probation period is generally helpful to analyze the candidate’s work, and if the intern is not familiar with the work, he may lose interest in your startup. 

To mitigate, have a probation period, where both the startup & intern can check the synergy and take a call accordingly. A month of working together can clear out what a year of interviews cannot.

2- How to Manage Interns

5. Give Training to Interns

Try to give the proper intern training for a couple of weeks to get the maximum output for the remaining days. Showcase your expectation and the company’s mission and understand the macro-level of the company’s future roadmap. It is the first stage for a company after the recruitment to give the proper training because it gives the future vision and explains why you’re here.

6. Assign Tasks in Fragments

Explain the task, assign them the projects, and demonstrate a bit before giving their first shot. Let them approach a problem in their way and encourage innovation. Allow interns to understand the problem and allot tasks requiring a high level of interactions- and if not following up, this is a sure-shot way for disaster.

7. Review Intern’s Work

Although the intern is responsible for their work, do not put interns under pressure. If they are working on a product that will have interactions outside the company, it’s crucial to have a more experienced review of their work.

It is good for everyone overall. The intern feels more confident in their work since he/she knows that there will be review and feels less pressure than when he is left alone to manage something.

8. Keep an excellent work culture.

Ensuring they are having fun while working as an internship is supposed to be a good learning experience. Build a bond with your interns. Provide company official email addresses, company merchandise (if you have), and free perks to go with, which will help them feel part of your startup.

If you follow the above tips for hire & how to manage Interns, you should be well on your way to creating a lasting and productive internship program for your company. Also, the interns’ performance depends on the culture and platform you’re providing to your startup.

Karan Jain

Born in the family of entrepreneurs and have inherited the same. Started building applications in order to pay for my tuition. Later founded a tech company, marketing agency, and media outlets.