Let's Get Serious About Returnships

As summer wraps up, and university students leave their summer internships to return to school, this is a good time to pause and rethink the internship. Working an internship is one of the best ways for students starting out in a field to gain skills, make professional connections, and build resumes.

But there is another group of established professionals that could benefit from internship experience – or returnships – and add a lot of value to the organizations as well.

The returnship is a way for people with established careers who have had to take time away for various reasons, to re-enter the workforce. For example, mothers or fathers who took a few years off to care for children or for elder care, have difficulty proving their skills are up to date in this fiercely competitive workforce.

But these are tried and proven professionals with records of accomplishments. 

I know there are arguments against the returnship such as it allows companies to take advantage of skilled labor for low or no cost. But if that labor is not being used in the labor market because of an inability to secure a job, that argument is moot. These are job seekers and the returnship is a tool for experienced professionals to gain the same benefits as university students: professional connections, refresh skills, and build current professional experience. There is also the argument that these workers are more expensive than employees right out of university. That may or may not be true, but these are false equivalencies regardless. A person with 10 or 15 years of work experience may in fact add more value than someone right out of school. They also may be ready to take a pay cut to get back into the labor market and get established.

In addition, returnships could be a great way for an established professional to make a career change. Someone who is an established financial planner, let’s say, may have some valuable skills to add to a non-profit while gaining skills to become a development and fundraising leader in a returnship. That person might not otherwise have been able to get through the door for an interview, but could learn important job skills in a new career path, while adding tremendous benefit to the returnship sponsor. It may be a limited term experience, or they might transition to a regular position, just as happens in internships.

We are unquestionably in a time of structural labor market change, with rapid turnover, a growing sector of short-term employees, and a tremendous amount of under-employment and slack. In order to attract and retain the best talent with the most to offer, employers need to think outside the box to develop a pipeline of talent beyond those right out of school.