Why not pay your interns?

The idea of writing such an article sprung out of the blue, so to say, seeing as recently, I've been hearing more and more students and fresh graduates continuously debating the unpaid internship problem. Even more so, a post by Isabel Estrada Carvalhais came to my aid. So, today's question is: Why not pay your interns?

A little disclosure before you dive into reading this - the content of this article might offend traditional office and corporate practices, as well as the leading execs and managers who enforce them. Not entirely sorry about it, though.

To begin - the way I see it, 'unpaid internship' is synonymous to 'gratuitous exploitation' which, further, in colloquial terms, translates to 'jockeying for the boss' approval' (not constantly, but more often than not, that's the case). While being 'paid' in experience can be a great prospect (and it is, in certain cases), if it's not supported by some financing, the motivation level will, step by step, decrease to 0%. Here are the main issues (excuses) and possible remedies (solutions) for the 'unpaid internship' problem: -

EXCUSE NUMBER ONE - THE LIMITED RESOURCES OF THE COMPANY

Corporate hardship doesn't come around just because of the 'times', as a lot of managers say when their own permanent employees ask for a raise. 'Times are hard...' is one of the lamest and a shameful excuse of an expression. This refers to some sort of hardship, but they never seem to pinpoint what it is that makes the 'times' so hard! As one does, we interpret - probably financial hardship. This is where confusion starts - most students and fresh graduates will try to migrate towards big companies to kickstart their careers, and that's something completely understandable. The pride and growth of self-esteem following an employment offer from a corporate giant is unequaled, and once it's added to the CV, the world doesn't look as bad as it did when completing those horrid logical reasoning tests. But what happens when the truth surfaces and students find out they're not just not getting paid, but the reason for which they're not getting paid? The interest level dropped by 50%, for sure (if not more!). 'Limited company resources' is an excuse which translates to 'You're here for yourself, to better yourself, for your experience. Being here should be enough!'. Sounds about right, doesn't it? We've all been there, at some point in time, no need to deny it. How are company resources limited? With an operating income of, for example $3 billion/year... how are these resources limited? Company resources are limited when the income is limited. A yearly operating income of $3 billion is nowhere near financial hardship.

SOLUTION NUMBER ONE - PROPER BUDGET ALLOCATION

Companies have tens of financial advisors, accountants, analysts (any financially-related jobs, to stop enumerating), and these people gather to make the company budget and the allocations to departments, etc. Creating a budget for internships/traineeships/(post)graduate schemes is a solution to this 'limited resources' idea that managers like to hug so tightly. This way, companies will know exactly how many interns/trainees/graduates they can take on board yearly or on a seasonal basis without overspending, and the newcomers would have another reason to come to work, not just 'experience'. Paying interns also means that they take ownership of their work and motivation to make decisions, making the experience 90% similar to the real job, actually preparing them for the real thing. Unpaid interns mean little to no motivation to actually do work - regardless if it's similar to the real job or tedious tasks. Overheard at big institutions: 'What am I doing here?'; 'I'm doing someone else's job and I'm not even getting credit for it'; 'I hate it here'; 'I work another job because this one doesn't pay', and there's more where these quotes from, I can assure you, dear readers, and you've probably heard your share, as well!

EXCUSE NUMBER TWO - THE LIMITED KNOWLEDGE OF THE INTERN

If an intern's limited knowledge is a problem, then this also means that even accepting interns is a problem, because they have limited knowledge, right? Not paying someone for the reason of possessing limited knowledge is complete hogwash and hypocritical to extreme, yet undiscovered levels. No one is born learned and experienced;- no manager started off by being a manager. They had to learn. They learned from their superiors! Even though interns are not permanent employees and they will not come into contact with all aspects of the business, they'll still have a supervisor who is tasked with teaching them aspects of the job and business. The problem is that interns are being treated as unreliable, inexperienced people, and that's crystal-clear belittling which can make someone doubt their worth and intelligence, professionally speaking. The limited knowledge of an intern should be no problem to a company - but to the contrary - it should be an opportunity to grow and train them exactly as they would want a permanent employee to be and to possess the same baggage of knowledge.

SOLUTION NUMBER TWO - FROM LITTLE RESPONSIBILITY TO FULL OWNERSHIP

Likewise to Excuse and Solution Number One, it is about allocation - here, we'll call it assignment flexibility;- all interns come at different phases/steps/levels of their education, whether it's first year or last year undergrad, or master's degree level. Some will know more, some will know less - and companies should expect that. Paying all interns, no matter of their knowledge or experience level, will stimulate the training and learning process, rendering positive results. Even better, the situation will stop being a one-way street and instead will become a sustainable practice, assigning tasks and projects tailored to the level of knowledge and experience level of the intern, so that everyone benefits from the results. The more they learn, the bigger the responsibility, until reaching full ownership.

"We want them to learn to pay their dues, not be hazed. We want them to be a part of our team." - Rob Bellenfant, 2020        

Sure, not all tasks will be job-related. Sometimes, they'll run into tasks they will hate to do - but it's part of the job, as a whole! One day, it's a huge project with 30 clients involved, and another, it's ticking boxes and drafting excels. An intern goes through everything a workplace has to offer, from super-interesting cases, projects, meetings, negotiations, to super-boring box-ticking. If the pay is right and team is right - all less-pleasurable tasks will go by much faster than if there's no pay and probably not a good team involved.

EXCUSE NUMBER THREE - NO ROOM FOR ADVANCEMENT

Overstaffed? Not quite. Some interns value more than some permanent employees, and you, my dear readers, probably have seen this happening more than once. I've seen interns who were ten times better than their own supervisor, but they couldn't be offered a permanent position, even though they were a perfect fit for the job, because the company is apparently overstaffed and this brings us back to Excuse Number One - limited resources!

A lot of teams started off with and as interns. Developing young talent should be a top priority for all companies, but this is seen more as a burden rather than an opportunity. 'No room for advancement' can translate to 'I can't have you taking my place', but the erroneous train of thought that this excuse entails unnecessary paranoia and irrelevant envy or jealousy. All people work towards a company's betterment, each at their own pace, and even managers and high-up execs are drowning in their self-induced anxiety that a 'youngster' might come in and take their place, so they deliberately refuse to make permanent employment offers to interns and even their own employees in order to stagnate the process of developing.

SOLUTION NUMBER THREE - BEST INTERNS MAKE FITTING FULL-TIME EMPLOYEES

An internship, whether we like to admit it or not, is a job interview, or something close to that. Whether it's a job interview for the far future (if one candidate interned in their first or second year and the company keeps an eye out for them) or for the close future (if a candidate is in their final year of study), the one-month, three-month or six-month internship represents a hiring process. It's easier to hire someone who already knows all processes and gimmicks, goals, and mission of the company, and it saves up time and resources when hiring an external candidate! Referring back to Solution Number One, a proper budget planning will help the company know how many full-time offers they can make to interns, without overspending or overstaffing. Making an offer shouldn't be a tedious process. It's like the traditional saying, 'when you know, you know', and it's a fact: best interns make fitting full-time employees, and these best interns help the company get much more than they thought at the start of a seemingly banal internship program.

Finally... no one should work for free. The paradigm has drastically shifted, and students are becoming more and more aware of their worth - and that is a positive aspect, because they know what kind of internships and jobs to seek, tailored to their level of knowledge and experience. Needless to say, this applies to evaluating whether to accept an offer or not, based on their calculations, from what they'd offer compared to what they're getting. Not all salaries are fair - sometimes they'd have to bite the bullet - but settling for $0 and just networking should never be an option.

Taking advantage of students and fresh graduates and screwing up their life schedule is something that is currently being addressed and more and more countries are imposing obligations on employers to properly establish internship programs which help the student/graduate with their career, not just be another face in another boring cubicle. Not to mention that students/graduates are gradually getting more and more sick of the fact that companies are making a mockery out of employment offers and completely depreciating one's value, rather than carefully seeing how they can make use of the intern and treat them with the professionalism they deserve.

Employers should stop making a problem out of paying their interns. Work is work, no matter at what level, and that's a basic principle. Being paid in experience is not enough anymore. Pay your interns - you're investing both in young talent and your company. Respect the work they do - you did it at one point, too.

End.