With restrictions being placed on essentially every aspect of our hiring it has made talent pooling an interesting endeavor. Sure, we have a few 'future opportunity' positions posted here and there, and the plethora of unemployed engineers in the area means I have a steady flow of unsolicited applications from experienced professionals.

But what of our entry-level talent?

Historically my company has had a strong co-op and intern program that was something of a farm system for our incoming talent. We brought in some of the best and brightest students from college career fairs, gave them summer jobs, and essentially tested them out. Those who did good work but had more schooling left were either placed on our hot list to hire after graduation or were invited back for another internship the following summer. It served as a great barometer for talent and has resulted in the hire of many talented employees.

This process is clearly not a new phenomenon, and I doubt the information above comes as a shock to anybody. What floors me, though, is that many companies are looking to scrap their intern programs altogether because of the economy! This is something that truly does not make any sense to me on several different levels.

College interns are inexpensive:
Let's face it; pay rates for college interns are nowhere near as high as full time staff pay. In fact, even the highest paid interns rarely make much more than half the hourly rate of a staff employee and they don't get things such as medical benefits or vacation time. On top of this, many college students are willing to work for free in order to gain experience. This turns into a very cheap (if not free) method of try-before-you-buy!

Good interns add value:
A good intern can be a great way to add some serious value to the company with a very small investment. Considering the low level of pay, any ROI from an intern is going to be high assuming they are a good, hard worker. Any good intern is going to be very eager to make a good impression because they are working for a job they don't have yet, and that is a pretty big carrot dangling in front of them.

Interns turn into entry level hires:
If a company has a solid intern program in place it makes recruiting entry level candidates very easy. At the end of the summer, or partway through the school year, job offers can be made to the top interns. You've had an entire summer to interview them and see how they work, so a job offer can be made with a great degree of confidence.

Interns have friends who are looking for jobs:
A good internship program will get a company a bunch of great PR for free. Let's face it, students talk with each other...a lot. If they had a good experience as an intern they will have it on their Facebook and MySpace pages, will talk to classmates, tell professors, and generally build up excitement about working for your company. If an intern program is strong enough, entry level hiring can sometimes be accomplished without going any further than the referral system and drawing on the network your interns have built for you.

Schools love companies that hire their students:
Hiring students for internships or entry level positions absolutely thrills colleges and universities. They want to boast great employment statistics, so they tend to get their hooks into companies that hire their graduating seniors. If a company begins to show a trend of hiring students from a particular college the career centers and professors will practically do the recruiting for you. They will start providing lists (and even resumes) of their top performing students with degrees that apply to your industry.

There are clearly plenty of benefits to having a strong intern program, and a company stands to lose quite a bit when they suddenly pull the plug on their program. Even if hiring has screeched to a halt for staff positions, I still think it wise to employ a few interns this coming summer. After all, building those relationships and getting the positive word of mouth traveling around is hard work, but grinding them to a halt is pretty easy to do.