Intern Training

Sparks Group is a national recruiting firm that connects prospective interns with partner companies. Intern training programs provide the opportunity for candidates to learn more about a wide range of specialties including career opportunities in IT, accounting, finance, human resources, and creative.

Internship programs enable students and young professionals to learn more about different industries, gain valuable business skills, and build meaningful connections with potential employers.

How to Train Interns For Success

Once hired, most companies train their interns with valuable skills that will help them grow and potentially earn full-time employment upon completion of the program. While most interns are eager to make an impact on an organization, most are inexperienced in business acumen and need assistance to reach their full potential.

Structured intern training programs provide a plan for tasks and include frequent check-ins to ensure progress and added responsibilities after successful completion. Here are some tips to guarantee interns receive the training they need to excel:

1. How to Train Interns For Success

Structured programs provide interns with an outline of what to expect throughout the internship, what skills they should acquire, and general information about work hours, dress code, intern responsibilities, and expectations. There should be frequent opportunities for feedback and evaluation to identify areas of strength, future growth, and development.

Learn More: Setting Expectations During Employee Onboarding

2. Know the intern’s previous experiences, skills, and interests

Having background information on each individual can help align the intern’s tasks with their past experiences, current capabilities, and interests. Internship coordinators and managers can start each intern with a level of work that is commensurate with qualifications.

For summer interns, being aware of fields of study, back to school timelines, exam schedules, and availability during school sessions are key to maximizing their potential while also being considerate of their education. Knowing their field of study can also help you to understand the type of work that will best provide real-world experience in their future career.

3. Assign interns to a mentor employee in their department of interest

Interns likely have few or no connections to your organization. Giving interns a mentor employee will provide them with individualized attention to better understand your business, build stronger bonds with employees, and have a go-to person for any business or career-related questions they might have.

4. Create assignments to challenge their skills

While interns might not have the expertise to initially thrive within your organization, creating projects to build their critical thinking, problem-solving, and collaboration skills are mutually beneficial. Your organization can identify interns strengths to make sure they are in a position to succeed, and the interns gain an opportunity to enhance their skills and learn more about your industry.

5. Invite interns to meetings

Beyond completing projects and working with employees, meetings give interns more insights into how the business operates and provides an opportunity to ask questions about the company and its projects. Meetings can also serve as a springboard for leadership opportunities – showing the interns how sessions are run so they can effectively contribute and add value.

Most companies commonly struggle with administrative hurdles when it comes to staffing intern training programs including:

Sorting through hundreds of applications
Reaching out to potential program matches
Contacting candidates to schedule interviews
Responding to candidate questions

These process can be long and tedious and partnering with a staffing and recruiting agency can streamline and expedite the intern hiring process.

Partnering with a staffing and recruiting firm to hire interns

Sparks Group is committed to helping organizations recruit high-achieving interns who will learn many new skills from the experiences they have at our partner companies. Our firm’s team of recruiters will identify qualified candidates that meet the needs of our partners for continued growth.

We have a long history of successfully placing candidates in internships across a range of divisions
including finance, creative, IT, and administration.

Learn why Sparks Group is the right employment agency to facilitate your intern hiring process. Complete our form and schedule a free consultation with one of our hiring experts today.