When you hire a student, you tap into inexpensive, motivated labour with fresh ideas. Hire a student and gain enthusiasm that can spill over to your other employees.
Tips to help you hire a student
Assign an in-house mentor for your student. Most students have little work experience and need someone to oversee their work.
Provide real, meaningful work. Be honest when you define the job. If you hire a student for a marketing position, don’t send them to fill in for your receptionist for the entire summer, claiming that transferring sales calls is a marketing job. Don’t hire an engineering student and then give them a full-time position as a filing clerk. If you need someone to do administrative tasks on a full-time basis, be upfront about it and hire someone who’s well informed about the realities of the position. Of course, every job – and every student job – has mundane administrative tasks. But make sure you represent any administrative jobs in an honest way.
Don’t stick the student in a corner. It can be challenging to find space for a temporary employee. However, it’s best if the student can work near your other employees. If you put them in a far-flung corner of the office – or, worse yet, in a storage closet or basement – they’ll feel disconnected from your company.
Set reasonable expectations. As a newcomer to your organization, a student needs to climb a steep learning curve. It’s unlikely that a student will hit the same performance goals as your veteran staff members.
Build a relationship. Even if your student employee heads back to school, it’s still possible to build a long-term relationship. Your student may refer colleagues, return for a future work term or seek permanent employment after graduation. In fact, years from now, they could be a peer or even a senior manager. Aim to build a positive working relationship – you never know, they may one day be your boss.
