The economy is secretly running on intern power
Tuesday, August 31, 2010 10:54:55 AM
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The economy is ‘secretly running on intern power’!
As the blue sky hopes of a 2010 end to the recession fade, Julia Margo (Acting Director of Demos) states ‘our economy is now secretly running on intern power...[and] what we actually need to do is increase the number of internships being offered’. According to her article in the Sunday Times, this year 350,000 young individuals will graduate ‘into an icy graduate labour market in which every bit of CV fodder counts’[1].
The same article states that 80% of this year’s graduates will undergo a work experience placement with a high number of these taking several placements until they find the correct match between employer and industry sector. It is not merely graduates who are fighting for the available work experience placement; Mary Curnock Cook, chief executive of University and Colleges Admission Service (UCAS), has advised would-be undergraduates to delay their applications by looking at going into work or using internships as the shortage of university places continues for this year’s school leavers.
However, the majority of these work experience placements, according to the business department’s Panel on Fair Access to the professions (PFA), will be conducted through friend and family networks; which raises concerns for graduates who are without these links and for the standard of the graduates being presented to firms who are not benefiting from a competition for places.
It is this process that is of greatest concern for Get Work Experience since it downgrades the benefits of taking on an intern for both parties. The result is often that the student is left isolated and unable to meaningfully add to the firm’s activities whilst the firm is simply satisfied to have appeased a friend or family member at the cost of finding space for them. We address this anomaly by being approached by firms who are actively looking for a student or graduate with the specific qualities required to successfully contribute to the businesses’ aims whilst we also vet those students whom we put forward for the positions.
[1] Article by Julia Margo in the Sunday Times 15th August 2010.
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