Online Internship Reduces Employee Turnover

Work-from-home internship programs have remained a trial and tested tactic to increase the recruitment and retention of early career talent. According to LinkedIn Learning Report, 2021 stated that 94% of surveyed employees would stay longer if their company invested in their learning. Including online internship programs as part of your employee retention strategy could help develop talent and build stable professional relationships.

What makes an online internship program a solid employee retention strategy?

National Association of Colleges and Employees reported that full-time employees hired following internships are up to 20% more and stick with their firm compared to non-intern hires. The numbers are most substantial in Year 1 and continue to show a double-digit retention impact in Year 5. As a result, the numbers clearly show that an unpaid or paid internship program’s long-term effects and ROI could bolster retention rates!

The development of future employees through internships is a low-risk, high-reward strategy for retention:

• Internships offer a blend of personal and organizational missions from their early stages, helping managers understand their interns’ deepest motivations. Studies showed that 81% of the surveyed workers do not get support from their company in their personal lives. Therefore, exploring the intern during their online internship and involving their values in their roles can create long-term benefits like satisfaction and higher retention.
• Work-from-home internships are also a trial period to examine an applicant in action beyond how they presented themselves in an interview. Employers should foster interns to consider whether the company is a good fit. Here again, employee retention applies a proactive approach and transparency in goals and values. 
• Interns with mentors in a company can enhance or create an interdependent and collaborative work environment. By recruiting existing employees into internship mentorships, internal engagement and retention chances rise by 50% and collaborative relationships by 37%. Hence, unpaid or paid internship and mentorship gains can reach an organization’s corners to increase employee retention.

Get a glimpse of innovative internship programs post-COVID

Personalized internship experiences: Gearing online paid internships toward sustainable employment contain flexibility. Present interns with many routes to fulfill their responsibilities or devise a customized strategy together.

Leverage flexible work models: Between Fall 2020 and Fall 2021, there was a survey of over 4000 interns to learn about their online internship experiences. The results showed that 80-84% of students were interested in fully work from home internship opportunities. Only a small percentage said they would only be interested in offline internships. Hence, offering remote, in-person, or hybrid work models is vital to promote accessibility and mobility. 

Establish a strong relationship with interns:

1. Spend one-on-one time with interns to understand what they want to learn and achieve.
2. Ensure that the intern connects with the company’s mission and how it relates to its mission.
3. Have the intern write a mission statement that the manager and intern can refer to and assess often.

Empower interns to guide their learning: Empowering interns to set themselves up for success. Managers can help interns by providing resources and advice, but interns’ goals remain their own. In this way, interns are charged with internal responsibility and autonomy while managers remain supportive figures. Instead of only external rewards, this can achieve a deep sense of personal achievement for everyone involved.

If you’d like to apply for online internship programs to upskill yourself, then ULead is here for you. Leadership is the most sought-after skill by all companies, and Ulead is the place to be if you see yourself as a corporate leader in the future. Empower students to become industry-ready through courses and internships. Enroll now!!