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Providing our Youth with an opportunity: What are the benefits of an ICT internship programme for professional services organisations in SA?

ConVista's Intern Development Programme contributes to broader youth development, and the organisational requirement for skilled talent, says Sheryl Cooke, HR Manager at ConVista Consulting.

By Sheryl Cooke
Cape Town, 31 Jul 2015
Sheryl Cooke, HR Manager at ConVista Consulting.
Sheryl Cooke, HR Manager at ConVista Consulting.

According to Stats SA, the current youth unemployment rate is 36.1% of the population aged between 18 - 35 as at March 2014. Yet, simultaneously, one of the biggest challenges facing South African ICT companies is a lack of skilled professionals, says Sheryl Cooke, HR Manager at ConVista Consulting.

These issues also impact on ConVista Consulting, with the search for talent being one of the major strategic focuses. ConVista's Vision has always included both a focus on learning and growing of individuals, as well as "...being passionate about transforming and enriching the communities we touch". An intern programme, therefore, did not seem to be a big leap.

The annual Intern Development Programme at ConVista, is run together with the support of the MICT Seta. This programme is one of the ways to contribute to both the broader youth development issue as well as the organisational requirement for skilled talent.

With any intern programme, there are going to be benefits and challenges for both the organisation and the intern.

One of the challenges faced by medium-sized professional services organisations is balancing the time to train vs time to bill for both the interns themselves as well as those individuals and teams elected to provide on-the-job-training. Another challenge is ensuring that all interns get 'real' work to do, as well as managing the customer expectations, if interns are in their space.

These challenges and issues can be managed in many ways, including focusing on those things that we believe make the programme work:

1. We have a rigorous, but fun recruitment process, which involves as many staff as we need to interact with potential candidates. This inclusive process ensures that we have committed people within the organisation who already feel a certain responsibility to facilitate the intern success.
2. Full two-week organisational induction prior to any work allocation.
3. Classroom-based skills training.
4. Real work on SAP as well as cutting-edge technology projects (both internal and customer facing).
5. Hands-on daily mentoring and on the job training.
6. Regular feedback and monitoring of performance.
7. Good communication, at every level, beginning with communication between the MICT and the organisation, communication between the interns and the organisation and communication between the organisation and customers.

The ConVista Intern Programme has brought with it, many hoped for benefits, some of which are: an opportunity for young graduates to gain real work skills, low-cost employees for eight - 12 months, an opportunity to observe and choose the best candidates for permanent employment, successfully assessed permanent hires that are immediately available, a 90% intern to permanent retention rate and continued support from MICT Seta, as we have worked collaboratively to build a positive and constructive relationship.

In our experience however, it has been the unexpected benefits, which have proved to be the most rewarding.

Our interns say that working for a medium-sized professional services organisation has allowed them access to groups of people and work they would not have had access to in a larger organisation e g mentors, executives, customers and so on. It means they have an opportunity to develop their communication skills in a perceptibly safer environment.

Through the recruitment process, the internal staff have been presented with an opportunity to interact with the broader SA community. They have had the opportunity to understand some of the issues our youth deal with on a daily basis. They have been inspired by perseverance, ambition and drive, even in extraordinarily challenging environments.

The organisation has also benefited from an influx of energy, passion and enthusiasm from the new interns, who look at each task as an opportunity to do something great. The interns bring new ideas and innovative thinking - a breath of fresh air to existing issues. This reminds current staff of the ConVista spirit which leads to an increase in the morale in the organisation.

From a mentorship perspective, the day-to-day mentoring of an intern is viewed as an opportunity for current staff to explore their leadership abilities in terms of teaching, coaching and work allocation in an environment that is well structured and supported.

According to ConVista CEO, Dylan Evans the business of ConVista "...is about people. It's about the people in all the communities we interact with. For us it really is about making things better."

Keep in touch with ConVista on LinkedIn: Here

www.ConVista.com

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Editorial contacts

Jacki Thorburn
ConVista Consulting
(+27) 21 551 9294
Jacki.Thorburn@ConVista.com