Federal IT Internships Fall Short

When it comes to recruiting and retaining entry-level IT employees, federal agencies often struggle with creating effective internship programs that get students in the door and keep them there. That's according to Tim McManus, vice president of education and outreach at the Partnership for Public Service, who is heading up an effort to help agencies recruit, hire and retain entry-level IT workers.

McManus told Wired Workplace on Thursday that five federal agencies are participating in the program, called FedRecruit IT, to work on IT hiring needs and create a staple of best practices for IT recruitment and hiring that can be replicated at other federal agencies. Across the five agencies, there was one common thread, McManus said: each lacked effective internship programs for IT workers.

"We're really trying to focus a good portion of our work with the FedRecruit agencies on either establishing or enhancing their existing internship programs to make them more robust and to really create them as a direct pipeline into full-time service," McManus said.

The Partnership also is working with the FedRecruit agencies to consider internship programs in their succession planning efforts, McManus said, noting that agencies should tie their internship opportunities to potential job openings they may have in the future. "If we know we need 10 people who have cyber experience, then what we need to do is make sure the interns are coming in with that type of expertise," McManus said. "It wouldn't make any sense to focus internships on systems architects if we don't need them long-term."

Is your agency effectively using internship programs to get entry-level IT talent in the door and keep it there? And are internship programs effectively tying IT talent to positions your agency may need down the road?