We've had an internship program going for several years here at Citrix, and it's worked out really well for us. Some of the best people on my UX team started as interns here, stayed on after their internships were over and worked their way up to more senior positions. We don't have 'client' work per se, but interns here do contribute to real product development work. I've had great experiences assigning interns to more senior designers or researchers in an 'assistant' role, helping with competitive analysis, phone screens, updating mockups, etc but we also make sure that interns have a bite-sized project they can complete in a summer and use for their portfolio. Those have ranged for creating a wiki for the UX group and organizing our internal resources (templates, articles, guidelines etc) to designing and running a small usability study and presenting results to the team. We structure it almost like a school project, with weekly goals and very clearly defined tasks, and it has typically worked out great. We also pay competitive wages for interns - they are paid hourly at a rate that's pretty close to an entry-level salaried employee in the same position. I feel strongly that unpaid internships at for-profit companies are both unethical and discriminatory - lots of lower-income college students get stuck working retail or in restaurants to pay the bills while their better-off peers spend the summer at "parent-financed" unpaid internships at tech companies and (the worst offenders) agencies. This lack of opportunity for work experience in their field makes it even harder for those kids to get ahead, even if they perform just as well in school. k ________________________________
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Dan Brown Sent: Tuesday, February 26, 2008 10:29 AM To: UX Management Subject: [Ux-Management] Internships 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 -- | work: eightshapes.com | book: communicatingdesign.com | blog: greenonions.com | talk: +1 (301) 801-4850
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