Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1510765
NOVEMBER 2023 I SMT007 MAGAZINE 63 Matties: Oftentimes, the image of internship is doing the work that the other people don't want to do. Hemingway: In fact, our interns get some enviable projects, to be honest with you. ey get the fun ones. EMa ran some stats, and it showed that 14% of our workforce started at SEL as an intern. So, it's a pretty significant part of our orga- nization. In some divi- sions, like engineering, it's more like 30%, so that tells you how deeply it's em- bedded. Johnson: As you get to the end of an intern's project, what do you expect or ask of the intern? Freiburger: We have interns hired year-round in a variety of roles. ey are constantly wrap- ping up a project with their project team, and then moving on to the next project. We debrief and talk about lessons learned, what went well, what didn't go well. As a supervisor, what could I have done better? What did I think that you as an intern could have done better? What were our wins and losses? en we ask, "Where do you want to go next? What project are we moving to, or is this the end of the internship?" Hopefully, by this time, they've already started to have conver- sations about where they want to go in a full- time capacity. What type of work are they hop- ing to get into? By that conversation, we hope to pair them with the appropriate teams, either internally or externally. Maybe they figured out they don't want to be in the electrical or mechanical engineer- ing industry. How can we find out what they want to do? If they're interested in staying at SEL full time, we can start that process. Some- times that means interviewing with a brand- new team. Hemingway: For interns who want to stay with SEL, we offer some internal networking and an internal intern career fair. Teams from all over the company talk to students who want to explore their options. As EMa mentioned, they're part of an intern community through- out their internship; we like to give them the opportunity to network beyond their immediate team. Matties: How do you celebrate their success? Freiburger: Histori- cally, we've done an intern appreciation activity on National Intern Day. Because we are a global company, and we have global interns, now we hold an Intern Appreciation Week. We host activities and panels with leadership, and we flip the pro- gram. Instead of leadership fielding questions from interns, interns get asked questions by our leaders: What are you working on? e past couple of years, we've started celebrating their wins, and the impact that they're making with our company. We want to highlight that work across the organization. It's bigger than just the day-to-day wins. SEL culture is good at naturally highlight- ing when things are going well. It might be a card or taking somebody out to coffee; we do it for interns as well. Oen their supervi- sors will come to HR and say, "Hey, my intern just did this project. How can I make others know about it? Can you help me get the word out?" We take those opportunities to high- light it both in the newsletter and in person. It's important to say, "You're doing a great job and you're contributing to this." Johnson: I'm sure that, occasionally, you have an intern who just doesn't work out. How do you handle that situation? Marisa Hemingway