| Disclaimer: I am a working student ("part-time" intern in Germany, more or less), should not make any difference though. Recurring meetings: This might be more personal preference, but I personally would go for scheduled meetings. Every day might be overkill though. Depending on the size of tasks, every other day will probably be just fine. Many questions will likely come up once actually doing work, so be somewhat available to answer them. Growth: This is probably a lot harder to do remotely, and also largely depends on the previous experience of your intern. One important thing my mentor taught me early on was how to scope tasks, ask the right questions and when to say no to something. When someone would ask me to do some report, I would always just do it and not question what exactly I was doing (Because for the most part, I did not really know). It turned out that often times the people asking me for it missed something that I had noticed right away but was afraid to ask. I would end up doing the report twice then. This obviously comes with experience and once you feel comfortable with the systems used etc., but once you feel your intern knows their way around, encourage them to be critical of requests and always ask questions if they notice something that might be off. Feedback: I would strongly suggest you do so. But also ask him/her, if he/she would like feedback. This also ties in with the growth aspect. You will need the first few weeks to identify strengths and weaknesses and once you notice a recurring theme, that is something you can give feedback on. Personal example: I was always trying to finish my tasks quickly and more often than not there were subtle mistakes in there, which were always super trivial to fix, but they were there. In my first feedback session, my mentor told me that he was absolutely astounded by my speed, but would rather have me take more time and be sure to do it correctly than rush it. This is obvious in hindsight, but especially if you want to prove yourself, it might not be clear whether it is better to be fast or correct. Some general things:
- Try to integrate your intern into your daily work life as much as you can. What I especially enjoyed was my mentor asking me questions about a task he had and was not sure how to proceed with it. Even if you do not get useful input at first, it helps your intern feel like actually doing useful work. And at one point he will likely be able to provide actual useful input to your day to day work, so its a win-win. - This is often unavoidable, but please try to give him/her actual work, not something like "Sort these folders by ascending date" or "Print out 50 pdf's and send them to customers". This depends on whether your intern got hired for a certain project or just a general internship though. |