Internship Supervision and Mentorship Tips and Tricks

Develop a Valuable Onboarding Experience

  • Work with the intern to create learning objectives or SMART goals, helping to provide structure around learning and set expectations for future feedback
  • Take interns on a tour of your facilities and introduce them to other employees or partners early in the experience. 
  • Give interns company materials to read such as newsletters, annual reports, organizational charts, or memos from the CEO.  
  • Encourage interns to spend breaks or lunches in places where employees gather 
  • Schedule regular 1:1 meetings or check-in to give or receive feedback 
  • Give interns the opportunities to attend and observe in professional meetings  
  • Allow and encourage interns to interview company personnel 
  • Encourage interns to walk around and observe others working 
  • Pair them up with other professionals who can share more about what they do and how it contributes to the organization

Provide Guidance & Feedback

  • Meet regularly with your intern to provide supervision and support
    • Review the internship position description and ensure goals are being met
    • Review objectives and/or SMART goals set between you and the intern and revisit any that have changed or need adjusted to ensure completion
    • Check in on tasks and assignments and ask about progress to help clarify expectations
    • Determine if additional assistance or training is needed to help the intern be successful
    • Ask the intern for feedback on their experience thus far and make necessary adjustments regarding concerns 
  • Written evaluations by both the intern and supervisor can provide the opportunity to publicize the success of your internship program and help to formalize the internship program for future interns and the organization
  • Help interns build a portfolio of work accomplished during the experience.  This helps provide a tangible outcome and provides the interns with a sense of accomplishment and professional growth they can reflect upon in future interviews
    • Some specific ideas for a portfolio may include: 
      • A copy of the job description 
      • SMART goals/learning objectives 
      • Performance evaluations 
      • Press releases, newsletters, charts, graphs, etc. that they helped create 
      • Specific project related documents/links that could be shared externally 
      • Consider having your intern do a final presentation to overview their internship experience to a small group
Internship Smart Goals and Mentoring Example

Coach & Mentor Your Intern

  • Interns desire a mentor who will help guide and encourage their support from the classroom to the work environment
  • Remember, an internship is an extension of the learning process so having someone ask questions about future goals and help connect them to opportunities and/or people who align with them  
  • Mentors also coach and advise around the ‘tricky things’ and provide positive encouragement will make the internship much more meaningful

Encourage Your Intern

Help interns build a portfolio of work accomplished during the experience.  This helps provide a tangible outcome and provides the interns with a sense of accomplishment and professional growth they can reflect upon in future interviews.

Some specific ideas for a portfolio may include: 

  • A copy of the job description 
  • SMART goals/learning objectives 
  • Performance evaluations 
  • Press releases, newsletters, charts, graphs, etc. that they helped create 
  • Specific project related documents/links that could be shared externally 
  • Consider having your intern do a final presentation to overview their internship experience to a small group