Recruitment and Careers News

Why should you offer work experience within your firm?

So this is quite a personal one to me. Although that said I guess everything we write is based on our own experiences isn’t it. So maybe a bit of an obvious start to this month’s blog! Considering my fifteen-year-old son did his work experience for Eventus Recruitment a couple of month ago. So, here we go ….

Cynical about work experience

For some reason I had it in my head that the careers department in school sorted every students work experience out but apparently no such department exists any more. So it was left to each individual to source an organisation that would be prepared to take under its wing an impressionable 14 /15 year old year ten!

I can absolutely understand why this prospect would appeal and potentially terrify a lot out there! Whilst pondering my sons work experience I came to the conclusion that it’s a really delicate age to do it … I mean we are asking businesses to accept responsibility for teens, who in many cases look like young adults, can occasionally present as balanced, measured and able young people but essentially are children for whom the work environment is a completely new experience. And lets face it are going to need absolute monitoring and ‘babysitting’ for the whole week to ensure nothing catastrophic or irreversible occurs! So yes, I reached the conclusion ‘why would and should firms offer work experience?’

Learning curve for everyone

So yes safe to say that pre my sons work experience, I was a little cynical and somewhat sceptical about the whole affair!

Fast forward though and I am a changed woman … well in respect of this issue anyway. I am now a massive advocate and would encourage it whole heartedly for both parties – student and businesses alike. So, I can’t say that my son bounced into Eventus Recruitment on his first day of work. He had the usual 15-year-old assumption that he would be bored and did he really have to stay for the whole eight hours every day etc etc… I am sure many of you know the script! However, it soon became apparent that the whole contrast to the school setting, as in you could go to the toilet when you wanted and you could have a drink at your desk had caught his attention.

As the morning went on and he had been given an overview of the business and what everybody did and then given a real task that yes was absolutely going to benefit the office if done properly. I could see that he was thriving and indeed enjoying being trusted and treated as an adult.

Shared Experiences

During that first day I kept catching his eye and was unsure as to what he was thinking. It was only later that evening at home that he shared with me how it was odd seeing me in my work place. And in his words seeing how busy I was and how many different things we dealt with. I think that was a fifteen-year-old boys version of ‘respect mum’!!

As the week went we would discuss different aspects of work during the evenings and it was becoming obvious that this whole week had brought another dimension to our relationship. It was kind of feeling as if we had this shared experience and he had seen part of me that the rest of the family didn’t really see and I think he liked that. So yes, I know this is personal and I know not many are lucky enough, or indeed would possibly want their young adult to do work experience with them, but from an incredibly personal perspective work experience was an incredible thing for us!

Straight from my young adult’s mouth …
“It was so much better than I ever thought, it felt good to be trusted and made me see what a real day looks like outside of school.”