Madsen Pirie

Gaining work experience

Twenty years ago, students typically took low skill “summer jobs” simply to earn money.  Now, most offices and organizations feature youngsters putting in unpaid time for work experience.  It might be a week or two, or even half a year.

The practice has its critics.  Union leaders are decidedly edgy about free labour competing for jobs with their members.  There are charges of exploitation and bad treatment.  The caricature has unpaid interns working photocopiers or being sent to collect sandwiches or laundry for management, without gaining any useful hands-on experience.

Some critics detect class bias in unpaid work experience, saying that only affluent middle class children can afford to work without pay, and that the middle classes network with friends to manoeuvre their children into suitable positions with key firms. 

Labour leadership candidate, Ed Balls, supports the proposal that all interns should be paid the minimum wage to prevent exploitation, though it is unclear whether this applies to his own staff and campaign workers.

Finding work experience takes effort.  Many City and media organisations are inundated with requests and have a gruelling process to select suitable applicants.  It is very competitive, with the biggest firms able to pick and choose the best applicants.

For employers, work experience is a useful way to assess a candidate’s strengths and weaknesses, and to make a full-time hiring less risky.  Over 1 in 5 of the 2009 graduates in employment had previously done work experience for the firm that hired them.  And it works the other way, giving interns the chance to see whether or not the firm they have chosen is really the right one for them.

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