Your Internship Program is Probably Illegal
I’m going out on a limb to estimate that 95% of the interns in the wedding industry are likely NOT interns. And chances are, if you have an intern, you are breaking labor law. I’m purposefully trying to FREAK YOU OUT because I don’t want you to get audited and fined. (We’re talking unpaid interns here.)
Are you awake? Go ahead, grab another cup of coffee.
Here’s the layman’s definition (my definition) of an intern…
An intern is a short-term educational opportunity to learn from a company. This opportunity is 100% educational in nature.
Did you get that? 100% educational. The internship needs to be actual training... on-going training… not “I teach you some things for an hour on your first day and then you are off to file papers, post blog posts, assemble wedding invites, run errands, make DIY projects, and tweet.”
NOPE. That ain’t gonna fly with the US Department of Labor.
When you have interns, you want to think of creating a classroom within your business.
Here is some info that explains the labor board criteria. (There are 6 criteria you have to have in place.)
Got it? OK… here’s the thing…
Around the ‘classroom’ structure, the intern can do “work” that augments a lesson… In other words, they can practice what you are teaching them.
So, if you are teaching them sales techniques, they could accompany you to a client meeting and/or conduct a sales meeting. If they are learning about marketing strategies using social media, they would be able to practice by doing some tweeting for you.
But- chances are they are not learning anything by filing papers.
The best way to protect yourself with an internship is to create a classroom structure where:
- YOU spend 1-2 hours teaching a new lesson
- INTERN spends 3-5 hours putting the lesson into practice (this is “on the job training”)
Here and here you’ll find a guideline for creating an internship program. An intern manual and/or training manual can be helpful in a) guiding you in training them and b) justifying your internship program if audited.
And – if you aren’t quite sure whether your team-members should be employees, contractors or interns, you’ll want to check out The People Plan.
Talk to me… please tell me you have some of these things in place. And, if not… how are you going to fix it?
This is GREAT Michelle. I have an intern, and the way that I’ve always thought of it to be was that it should be for the benefit of the intern, NOT the company. I get people all. the. time asking me what it’s like having an intern and for tips, but they usually just want free labor and it’s terrible! Also, I’m a firm believer that if they can’t be compensated with a paycheck, they should be compensated with school credit. My current intern comes to weddings with me, and sometimes I need her to help with set up and breakdown and whatnot, but I try to compensate her for those hours. Everything else is shadowing us, going on Pinterest to see wedding trends, sitting in on phone calls with me, and just hanging out at our studio, seeing how we run things. It KILLS me when I see other people taking advantage of their interns, and their interns not doing anything about it!
You got it, Joelle! And internship needs to be for the benefit of the intern… not the company. I love how you’ve structured your relationship with your intern! Compensating an intern for ‘non-educational work’ is a great solution – and a great balance – for those times when you do need to have *work* out of the relationship. I haven’t seen that before.. but, I really like that. Thanks for sharing this!
Awesome post! Thanks for the insight!!!
If a company needs clerical assistance, they can hire an intern from a local community college who is majoring in Administrative Management (which is what I looked into before finding my new person).
Such a great tip, Andria! Colleges often have structured internship programs that make it easy for the employer to set up the internship program. I love this idea of specifically targeting the subject/study area to fit your business needs.
This is why I’ve never taken on an intern, and only hire paid assistants… too many grey areas.
This is such a great post! I am currently on boarding my first interns and this is so helpful. Luckily I have a great book keeper who keeps me on track. I love teaching, so interns are great for my business. Thanks for sharing!
You’re welcome, Ginger! I love teaching too… and I’ve always loved bringing on people because of this aspect of training. Good luck with your new hires!
Such a great post! We have always had interns that are receiving college credit through their accredited university and work closely with the students professor or mentor at said school to make sure we are on the right track! I think another key point is, an intern should NEVER fill the place of a paid/trained employee! Thanks for this post!
That’s a great point to bring up, Antonia. I think most people think that the point of having an intern *is* to fill that void… but that isn’t correct. There really can’t be much benefit to the company… which doesn’t make it worth it to many employers. Thanks for adding insight!