The Rocky Transition from Intern to Full-time Hire: Why Millennials Love You as Interns & Leave You as Full-Time Hires
In an effort to stay competitive, companies are seeking employees with an aptitude for technology, innovation, customization, and flexibility. Many, believing that the Millennial generation has these core competencies, have beefed up their University Relations and college intern programs as a way to fill their talent pipelines for the future. These intern programs are quite successful in developing and motivating Millennials to work. The problem is in the transition to full-time hire. Specifically, the experience that new graduates receive as interns is in stark contrast to what they experience as full-time employees. This disconnect causes high Millennial attrition and damages the reputation of the employer as a desirable place to work.
Avoiding the Bait & Switch
Millennials want opportunities for meaningful work from the start of their employment. They are ambitious in their professional development and expect their managers to regularly engage them in career pathing discussions and to act as coaches in their networking. Millennials value community and are looking to the workplace to provide them with opportunities within the company to build their network.
For the most part, companies are successful in providing Millennials with these experiences during their internships, and in creating a positive environment so that these interns will return for full-time roles. However, the same companies fail to provide consistent experiences to Millennials when they transition them to full-time employees. The reason for this is threefold:
- Lack of integration between Intern, University Recruiting and Talent Management functions: The person or team running the intern program does not fully coordinate efforts with Recruiting. In turn, Talent Management is not in the loop. As a result, messages and initiatives that touch new graduates often conflict with what they have been told or experienced as interns. The lack of continuity can feel like a bait-and-switch and leaves Millennials with negative impressions of the employer. Coordinated planning and execution among these critical departments can resolve this issue and increase Millennial retention and engagement.
- Management discomfort with providing performance feedback and career development: Managers are often promoted to supervisory roles because they demonstrate mastery of a technical task. Despite corporate efforts to develop their “people” skills, many remain uncomfortable or unskilled in providing frequent performance feedback and career development, something Millennials expect. Training and coaching, that focuses specifically on Millennial engagement, can teach managers to motivate and develop these workers effectively.
- Generational conflict between managers and their subordinates: The managers of new graduates are often members of Generation X, an independent and skeptical generation whose experiences, values and expectations of work are in direct conflict with those of the Millennial generation. After exciting summers of personalized guidance and hands-on development, working daily for Gen Xers is a rude awaking for most Millennials. Building generational savvy into new hire orientations will successfully manage expectations and equip Millennials with crucial strategies to work effectively across all generations.
Creating a Seamless Transition from Intern to Full-Time Hire
The purpose of most corporate intern programs is to build an effective talent pipeline and employer brand. Intern programs are costly and must have a high return on investment to prove valuable. To succeed, and to create competitive advantages in their industries, companies must create a seamless transition and experience from intern to full-time hire. Doing this well is possible, but requires a critical look at organizational structure and culture, as well as the roles and skills of the people asked to navigate the transition.
Amy Hirsh Robinson, MBA, is Principal of the Interchange Group and a leading expert on the impact of generational differences in the for-profit and not-for-profit workplace. She consults to C-level leaders on enterprise-wide strategies to reduce attrition costs, increase profitability and create agile workforces able to adapt to change. Amy is a popular speaker and author on the topic of attracting, retaining and managing top talent, and has been cited and quoted in publications such as Forbes, the Los Angeles Times, and the Huffington Post.