Dan, We used Interns extensively in the Information Architecture group of a former agency that I was with for many years. In fact, that was how I started back in 2001.
I highly recommend it. If you screen properly, you can usually find some hard working, ambitious "gems" coming out of an academic program that you have confidence in. You bring in the Intern for a limited time (in our case it was anywhere from a month to a summer), and pair them with a Senior practitioner. This has a dual benefit -- the Intern assists the Senior with "grunt" (non-client facing) work, as well as participates and learns through observation things like process, company culture and expectations, client meetings and management skills, etc. The Senior can check out the Intern's potential, groom them appropriately, and if all goes well, at the end of the Internship you have a very good prospect for a Junior employee. It really can have win/ win benefits, and our experience was that hired Interns made very loyal employees, as well as went on to be excellent "groomers" as they scaled in rank. It's not without some effort on the company's part, but in our situation it was immensely beneficial to the overall quality of our group. Not to mention, Interns always help those of us who work too much to stay connected with what is being taught and talked about "on the outside". Best, Hannah Galloway > > Date: Tue, 26 Feb 2008 13:28:46 -0500 > From: "Dan Brown" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Subject: [Ux-Management] Internships > To: "UX Management" <[email protected]> > > I just got an email from someone asking if EightShapes has any open > internship positions. I have to admit, it made me think. > > I've never been an intern and only have had very limited experience > managing > interns, so would like to solicit other managers on their experience: > > * Has anyone used them in a design setting before? > * What's the best way to get the most out of the internship? > * What financial arrangement did you have? > * Did you use them on client work? > > I listened to a podcast a couple months ago on Joel Spolsky's internship > program at his software company. His shop is almost pure development, and > they build products -- they don't do client work. > > Still, he uses interns as a recruiting mechanism. Brings them in, assigns > them a project (for the summer) and ultimately (if it's a good match) > hires > them. It made a heckuva lot of sense to me. > > Nathan and I could probably use a similar model but: > > (a) It would be difficult to use interns on client work > (b) I'm not sure if we would have time to evaluate or mentor their work > outside current billable projects > > Any guidance or suggestions (or horror stories or more questions) would be > most welcome! > > -- Dan
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