Ask HN: What do you ask your interns as they finish up for the summer? - ryanchants
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DoofusOfDeath
In case the basic questions aren't obvious:

\- What were your goals for the internship, and how do they compare to what
you actually got out of it?

\- What are the top 3 things you'd change about the way our internship program
works?

\- What are the top 3 things you think worked well?

\- If you could repeat the internship knowing what you know now, what would
you do differently?

\- What advice would you give to company leadership (at any level)?

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katamaritaco
I'd consider asking them how _they_ felt about their experience/the
company/procedures/etc..

Getting fresh eyes from an intern can provide valuable insight into things
you're doing right, and things that could be improved.

~~~
ThorinJacobs
+1 On this, and I'd want to encourage them to provide this feedback throughout
the internship as well, not just at the end. Sure, sometimes they'll have
suggestions that we've considered and decided not to do, but if it's a common
question we should document.

For helping the interns, I'd talk to them about what they learned, what their
next career steps are, and what subjects they're most interested in. Ideally,
you have a mentorship program setup already where this has already been
discussed, so this may end up being very brief. But even without a mentorship
program, having good discussion about how you can help the interns aside from
just having an extra line of experience on the resume is healthy for both
sides.

For improving the program for future interns, I'd also ask them what they
wished they knew when they first started their internship. For all of the
above, make sure that it's a safe environment to have honest discussion - for
instance state outright that they're not going to burn bridges by pointing out
process flaws or talking about working at other companies in the future.

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CryoLogic
I mean if you are using interns as a way to find future employees, I'd check
out the code they wrote for the best metric.

Most of them are probably hungry for a high paying tech job, and will tell you
they want an offer / want to work with you. Even if to just get another offer
for some bargaining power. It's probably worth asking them questions about how
easy it was to ramp up and such if you are in a position where you can improve
those systems.

Check out the code, is it well written? Modular? Documented? Did they go
through the proper steps in your sprints / documentation? Ask their mentors if
they asked questions when blocked, etc.

If they worked hard, had a good attitude / could get along with the team and
wrote good code (remember they are new to coding most likely) - and you think
they have a lot of potential than consider giving them an offer.

~~~
ryanchants
I can do all of this outside of a one-on-one/exit interview type conversation
though. We really focused on iterative feedback during their internship.

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ForrestN
What can we do to make our internship program more inclusive and less reliant
on the preexisting privilege of our interns?

~~~
ForrestN
Thanks for the downvotes for literally posting a question I've asked interns
in the past. Always important to remember the reflexive cultural conservatism
of HN's audience.

~~~
dang
One reason the site guidelines ask you not to complain like this about
downvotes is that often, by the time the dust settles, people have given more
upvotes. Then in addition to being off-topic, the complaint is misleading.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

