my intern keeps pushing for a full-time role

by Alison Green on November 7, 2024

A reader writes:

I recently took on my first intern. I let them know from the get-go that I didn’t know if it could evolve into permanent work given the current work pipeline. They are ambitious, smart, and eager to learn, and I have done my best to give them “real world” learning experiences so they make their resume look great.

All of that is good except a few weeks in, I am getting constant questions from them about potential employment. I have told them that if all goes well and I have the means, I’d love to hire them but I don’t have the ability to answer that right now. I understand why someone interning would want to know their chances for a job, but I have been totally transparent and the constant questions are starting to test my patience.

I feel as though, this early, they really should be focusing on learning and making the most of the opportunity, rather than focusing on jumping to the next step right away. They are starting to apply for full-time roles, which is excellent, but these roles are rather senior (and I don’t have to heart to say, are way above their experience level). It’s also confirming my suspicions that this person feels they’ve learnt the entire industry in a few weeks. They’re a great intern other than this, and I’m trying to help, but how do I get them to chill out and just focus while they’re on the job? I don’t want to be a jerk, but I am losing my patience.

I answer this question — and three others — over at Inc. today, where I’m revisiting letters that have been buried in the archives here from years ago (and sometimes updating/expanding my answers to them). You can read it here.

Other questions I’m answering there today include:

  • Will being associated with a yelling boss hurt my reputation?
  • What’s the best timing for messaging laid-off colleagues?
  • Connection requests from recruiters
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{ 37 comments }

{ 37 comments… read them below or add one }

  1. Lady Danbury*

    I used to have a yeller boss. Not only did it not hurt my reputation, I now work for someone who was the target of his yelling and was impressed with how I handled myself in that meeting. As long as you conduct yourself professionally, his yelling shouldn’t impact how people perceive you.

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  2. DEJ*

    Please do reach out to your colleagues after layoffs, whether you do it a few hours, a day or a few weeks later. Knowing someone thought about them means so much. For various reasons I was not totally ok for a few years after I got laid off, so waiting until someone is ‘ok’ could be awhile.

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  3. Antilles*

    #1: I know it’s just a typo due to the updates for Inc, but I chuckled at this:
    Be direct: “I’m sorry if I haven’t been clear. I won’t be able to give you any answer on full-time employment until at least February, so it’s a conversation we need to table until then.” If you say that and it continues anyway: “I’ve tried to be clear that this isn’t a conversation I’m in a position to have until at least August.
    Just casually adding six months to the timeline every time the Intern repeatedly bugs you about the same question probably would really drive that message home.
    #3: If you found out through normal “public” channels (LinkedIn post, company grapevine, other colleagues), then I don’t see any reason you can’t reach out right then and there. If they’re still feeling the hurt or processing it, then they’ll likely be thankful for the outreach.

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    1. Ask a Manager* Post author

      Literally laughed out loud at the Feb/Aug problem — like you should punish them by pushing it further out because they were being annoying. (But I’ll ask them to fix it.)

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  4. Sloanicota*

    The whole point of interns is that you have to be explicit about stuff with them. They don’t know the norms yet and you should be prepared to directly and clearly explain that kind of thing. There’s no point in getting impatient with someone who doesn’t know something already when the entire premise is that they’re here to learn.

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    1. anonymous anteater*

      agreed. I feel like the LW is actually giving very vague replies (I don’t know if it could work out/if all goes well I’d love to hire them), that could be interpreted favorably by a hopeful intern. More clarity is needed. Same for applying for those senior roles.

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    2. Blue Pen*

      Yes, agreed. I don’t say this at all in a disparaging way, but in my experience, interns (and student workers) tend to have main character energy. They don’t realize there is an entire working world operating without them in mind. And I get that; they’re generally young and come from like-minded settings (e.g., school) where they aren’t always pushed or challenged.

      But everyone has to start somewhere. Who I was at 18, 19, 20, etc., is not at all who I am now. Don’t be impatient with them. Ambition and drive are not things to discourage. Give them the framework and the perspective they need to channel those things in a productive, rewarding, and fulfilling way.

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      1. Na$ty Larry*

        You’re not wrong. A lot of the time, it’s the nature of being in an internship that gives you main character energy. At least this is the case in my field; we go out of our way to do fun culture activities, free lunches, fun special learning projects etc. for interns and they also don’t have to do any real work with real ramifications either, so it can give off the “You’re so awesome and the most important person here!” vibe super easily.

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      2. MigraineMonth*

        I think it’s also about the shift from a school setting, where helping the student succeed is part of the mission statement, to a business setting where the company’s needs come first. I remember being very confused in my first real job that my manager wasn’t acting like a career advisor and helping me grow into my next role; she just wanted me to get the TPS reports in on time and didn’t really care why I found their layout counter-intuitive.

        (Yes, ideally your manager also helps you be happy in your job and figure out your career path, but that’s because it makes good business sense to have happy and growing employees, not because employee growth is their number one priority.)

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  5. Juneau*

    Is it possible that the intern is terrified of being unemployed in this economy? I certainly wouldn’t blame them for being anxious.

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    1. Caramel & Cheddar*

      I think even when the economy is fine and everyone is hiring, it can be terrifying as a young person to not know what’s coming next after your internship ends if you don’t have something lined up. Post-secondary students are used to being told, for example, if you want to have your summer job lined up for May, you need to look for jobs in February, etc. so they’re often doing one thing while lining up the next thing. Not having the next thing lined up is stressful!

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      1. MigraineMonth*

        Especially if they’re coming to the end of a fully-planned path. There are quite a few kids who have a fully-scheduled expected life path from preschool all the way through the end of college–often including sports/summer camps/extracurriculars/volunteering–but no clear idea what to do after that.

        “Use an internship to land a full-time job so you don’t end up homeless” is a tried-and-true strategy, and it may be the only one the intern knows.

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    2. Becky S*

      OR, they think they have to be very assertive to get the job.
      I’ve had pretty good success with “I don’t have anything new to say about that”

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  6. samwise*

    OP 1
    An intern is there to learn. You are doing your intenr a disservice by getting BEC with them when you have not even told them to stop! You can say what you wrote “this early, they really should be focusing on learning and making the most of the opportunity, rather than focusing on jumping to the next step right away.” And you should tell them (nicely) that continuing to ask this early and this often will come off as annoying and unprofessional, so they need to stop it.

    Applying for senior level roles: again, this is an intern, who does not have the knowledge and experience to know what is a reasonable level role to apply for. Not sure why you’ve jumped to “this person feels they’ve learnt the entire industry in a few weeks,” when it’s much more likely to be ignorance and inexperience. It’s part of your job to let them know. Maybe set a time to sit down with them and explain the different levels in your industry, what experience and skills are needed to get them, how to recognize an entry-level position, how this internship can help them gain a beginning towards needed skills and experience, etc.

    This reminds me of the way college faculty will fume about students’ inability to write good college papers, especially freshmen, or griping about the 5-paragraph essay. But of course they’re bad at it! They haven’t been college students before, they don’t know what a college paper even is, all they’ve learned is 5-paragraph essays, and maybe you, the professor who knows what you want, could actually give them guidelines, refer them to the campus writing center, etc. (Climbs down from soapbox)

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    1. Fíriel*

      Here here! Your intern needs guidance, which is what they’re there for! If they already knew everything, they’d be in one of those senior positions already.

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    2. Analytical Tree Hugger*

      Regarding college faculty, a perspective from someone who teaches college biology to freshman (of a range of ages): You’re severely overestimating the ability of students to follow instructions. For lab write-ups, I give them a template and a specific list of pieces to include in each section (e.g., list your control variables here; list a graph with these features here).

      In the first write-up of each semester, at least 80% of the students don’t follow the instructions. By the fourth write-up, at least 50% still don’t follow the instructions.

      Additionally, based on my own experience as a freshman and college student, every essay assignment I was given included specific guidelines and a rubric, as well as discussions of how to write a paper, so I’m not sure I understand the basis for your soapbox. Educators are, well, educators. We provide structure to students to learn, yet somehow you’re saying it’s our responsibility to make students read and follow that structure?

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      1. bamcheeks*

        As another educator— yes? Every single advancement in pedagogy is pretty much how to improve the process of “the information is there for those with the ability to get it” and to find better ways of helping them get it and increase the pool of those who get it. I’m not saying it can’t be frustrating in the same way that every job can be frustrating, but that is why it’s a job and not something we do for fun.

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        1. daffodil*

          Sure, but when you’re doing all the best practices and students give you instead what they assumed you would want before you even gave them instructions, that’s hard to overcome.

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        2. MigraineMonth*

          I was the TA for a graduate course and, following by the rubric, I gave everyone a B- or lower on one of the assignments. The professor took a look at the submissions and asked, “How did I mess up teaching this so badly?”

          “Following the directions” is one of the most difficult skills there is, and the human brain is not designed to do it. Just think how many professions you could master if you were able to always follow the directions.

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      2. Disappointed Australien*

        In my somewhat limited experience there was a lot of assumed knowledge that changed between departments and schools. The one that really sticks in my head is going from my Engineering major “we penalise you 1% for every 1% you go over the word limit” to a Sociology course “we expect 50% over the word limit, less than twice the limit cannot get an A”. Similar issues with the difference between an engineering deadline and a Psychology loose suggestion about when work could be submitted (one social science teacher *lost* an essay I handed in three months early. Which is a whole different problem).

        That is to say that you can be as clear as you can possibly be, and still forget to mention obvious things. But at the same time, no matter what you do there’s always a better idiot (“software engineering is the challenge to build idiot proof programs in the face of ever more capable idiots” Harsh but true, not least because people keep wanting software to do more difficult things).

        The Crooked Timber blog regularly covers university pedagogy from a teaching perspective if you aren’t already drowning in such things.

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    3. a clockwork lemon*

      I understand that this isn’t necessarily the norm, but in my field there is an expectation across the board that every intern is at least competing for (if not actually guaranteed) an offer after the successful completion of their internship. Yes, an intern is at the internship to learn, but it’s not unreasonable at all for an intern to want to know early on in their internship if there’s the potential for a full-time job at the end of the tunnel.

      In many, if not most, cases, the interns NEED to know if they’re going to have a job at the end of the internship because if they don’t, they need to be applying to other jobs while they’re interning. Personally, I ended up in a squishy “there’s probably a job” internship and got strung along with vague answers while my then-boyfriend (now husband) supported both of us on an entry level salary. I bailed on the internship as soon as I found a salaried position and didn’t feel even slightly bad about it.

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  7. Bookworm*

    As someone who was in a somewhat similar situation, I would recommend being as honest as you can about this. I was led to believe I was on track for being hired for a FT role from an internship and had no idea there were any problems. Meaning, I would ask for feedback or if there were any issues and was told it was always fine, so no clue.

    You can see where this was going. Ended up having an uncomfortable position, was given an extra month to find new work and was told that I made too many mistakes and was too slow. When I pointed out that I did try to make the effort, I was told that yeah, staff need to be better about giving feedback and in managing. They did hire someone who literally had no experience and had been working on a fishing boat instead of me, partially because he and the supervisor had college connections in common. >_<

    To this day I'm not sure if they only meant for me to be a temp and they changed their mind, if they were honestly too gutless to have honest conversations with me or if I did something else wrong. But a little honesty would have gone a LONG way.

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    1. Skytext*

      Bookworm, don’t beat yourself up over this. I would bet anything that your work was actually fine, you were neither too slow nor made too many mistakes. That’s why they kept giving you feedback that it was fine! That glass bowl just wanted to hire his buddy, so he made you think it was your fault.

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  8. Caramel & Cheddar*

    1) Honestly, unless you work somewhere where an internship turns into employment by design as long as they get good reviews, I wouldn’t even hem and haw about “Check back with me in a few months” if the best they can hope for is that a job opens up magically at the exact same time as their internship is ending.

    I know a lot of young people will hear “maybe” as “there’s definitely a chance!” but will interpret that percentage chance much higher than their manager means it. I think it’s worth just being clear about how things typically go in your company, e.g.

    – “This is an internship program that has a pipeline to a job at the end should you get a good review at the end. To get a good review, our expectations are XYZ, and you’ll be assessed on ABC.”
    – “Interns who are successful during their internship period are invited to apply to our seasonal positions that get posted in February/May/October, but it’s a competitive pool and there is no guarantee of employment.”
    – “Turnover isn’t very high here for our entry level positions, so while you’re welcome to apply for any that open up at the end of your internship, the likelihood that a posting will coincide with the end of your internship isn’t especially high due to what our hiring cycles are like.”

    Etc, do what works for you and what you know about your workplace hiring cycles, but making it super clear about what they can expect would be a kindness to people who may not have much experience knowing how any of this works. A lot of people are steered towards internships by well meaning people who think it’s a good way to get hired at the end, and as we know that’s not always the case.

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    2. Ellis Bell*

      I completely agree with your second sentence; the intern totally believes that a job is practically guaranteed. Inexperienced people see companies as job factories and think the word “maybe” is only related to their job performance, and impressing the boss with their enthusiasm, not that the job might never exist. They simply don’t consider wider factors that they never have to think about. I’d be really, really explicit on this one: that the job isn’t there, and that you need to see a focus on experience. “I keep getting the impression that you think there’s a permanent job attached to this, but this was always a temporary position simply aimed at giving someone a decent amount of experience; most of the roles you’ll apply for in this industry will want x-months’ experience. Does getting that experience here still work for you, even though you may end up applying for other companies?” I like the descriptions above about the likelihood of a permanent job; if I couldn’t quantify the possibility at all, I wouldn’t refer to the potential job at all until it exists.

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  9. I should really pick a name*

    They are starting to apply for full-time roles, which is excellent, but these roles are rather senior (and I don’t have to heart to say, are way above their experience level)

    Providing this information to them is a kindness, even if they don’t take it well.

    It allows them to refocus their job search instead of continuing to send out resumes to jobs they’re definitely not going to get.

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  10. merida*

    OP #2 – yelling boss
    In my experience, unfortunately, yes… if your boss’s bad behavior is consistent, it can affect your reputation. I had a previous atrocious manager who was also our department leader. She was a big yeller and infamously said she disagreed when a different manager told her that yelling at staff is not a good motivational tactic. She was quite challenging over email, too, and often came across as rude or hostile. Because she was the figurehead of the department, other departments were afraid of all of us. I only learned this because as I started getting to know colleagues across the company, people would end up confessing their surprise that I and my team were so nice and easy to work with because Boss gave a very different impression. For example, I eventually had to discretely tell some colleagues that if they wanted a question answered, they should just go directly to me and not Boss (since Boss would just chew them out for asking to begin with rather than being helpful). I was always trying to smooth over the ruffled feathers that Boss left in her wake so other departments would hopefully not feel afraid to approach us in the future. (and then I left, hooray!)

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  11. A Simple Narwhal*

    I’ll add my voice to the others, you definitely need to say something to the intern.

    Anytime I’ve been annoyed by an intern, I have to remind myself that 99% of the time they literally don’t know any better. And that they’ll never change/improve if they aren’t made aware that they’re doing something wrong.

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    1. CB212*

      Absolutely, LW 1 would be doing them a true career service by being very clear about A, the possibility of future employment and B, the professional impression they will make if they continue pressing for it (or repeat this in a future entry level job). Their expectations or hopes sound like they’re off base for your industry or company, but they probably have friends in intern tracks that are more like a fostadopt program, and they may well believe that’s normal in your field too. (There are so many law firms where it’s the talk of the entire firm if an intern is NOT offered a job at summer’s end…)

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  12. SunnyShine*

    lw 1: Seems like he’s doing a lot of new to the workforce behavior. If he’s an intern, he probably doesn’t understand office norms and culture. Most college and parents don’t prep college students for this role either. He would benefit from having a frank conversation.

    If he’s close to graduating, it’s possibly that he’s asking because he acts to know if he should apply for roles or accept other opportunities.

    If he’s interested in senior roles, it’s okay to tell him how much experience it requires. Something like: “To do that role, you typically would start in this entry level position and get at least 4 years of experience.”

    You can also offer to help him find the correct roles to apply for.

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  13. wounded, erratic stink bugs*

    FWIW, when I was early career I had a former boss tell me that some of the jobs I was applying for expected significantly more experience than I had. I was a little embarrassed not to have already known that or understood it from the way the postings read, but I was glad he told me. And in hindsight, I don’t think I had anything to be embarrassed about; it’s just hard being 23 and not knowing everything. Especially because this person is your intern so it’s explicitly a teaching/learning relationship, I think it’s really fine to tell them straightforwardly that they aren’t experienced enough for things they’re applying for.

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  14. Frosty*

    Re Intern – I’m also curious to know how the intern is phrasing these requests and questions about full-time work. If it’s repeated “so can you hire me now?” that might be frustrating, but I’d be willing to bet it’s more comments like:

    Is this the quality of work you expect from people you hire full time?
    (Upon receiving positive feedback) “A few more successful projects like this and I bet I’ll be ready to be hired!”
    Is there something people can do to set themselves ahead to be hired?

    Etc.

    In which case, if you’ve been clear you can’t address hiring conversations in an official capacity at this time, then you can just answer the questions as they come.

    Don’t let yourself get irritated – it’s extremely stressful out there right now in the job market, especially when you don’t have the experience that every posting is asking for. Give the intern a bit of a break and make sure you’re teaching them the norms of your industry.

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  15. Meep*

    The intern reminds me a coworker I had who managed to con his way into using credits from his Bachelor’s degree to go towards his Master’s degree (which is fine if you take the 500-level over the 400-level) to his PhD (not allowed), because his dad was the Head of a completely different department on campus. He decided, at the ripe old age of 24, that he had earned the title “Senior Engineer” and put it on a presentation he gave to a client. Oh boy, was the owner steaming mad and chewed him out after.

    His fix was to put “Principal Engineer” (a higher title for those who don’t know) on the next one. He lasted a year.

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  16. Frank Doyle*

    You “don’t have the heart to” . . . do your job? It’s your job to instruct your intern on professional norms. Don’t do him a disservice by being shy (??) about reasonable expectations.

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  17. DJ*

    #3 I think it’s very kind to reach out to people who have been laid off to send them a message of support. Agree with Alison may be leave a day or two purely to ensure they do read your message.
    Also kind to suggest a coffee catchup (your shout) with those you’d like to keep in touch with/develop a friendship with.
    Most people would appreciate it at a hard time!

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