Extract from More than Making Tea Payroll World, May 2007 Work experience can benefit the student and the business, but there are risks you need to be aware of, as Cherry Park explains The old adage about students on work experience doing the filing or photocopying, making the teas and trying to appear busy no longer holds true to a large extent. Employers are now offering much better considered and planned placement programmes, bringing real benefit to both students and business. That said, there is still much to be done. On the back of increasing concern over numbers of young people in neither education, employment or training, a new Confederation of British Industry (CBI) report, Time Well Spent, argues the case for young people to gain experience of employment while they are still at school. The report revealed that while 90% of students enjoyed their work experience and 80% felt it gave them a good insight into work, most did not feel they had been given clear goals or valuable feedback from employers. Half of employers admitted room for improvement in their schemes for the development of employability skills... ...Clearly those on work placements benefit from the opportunity to develop work skills, understanding and experience that they can use in the real world. So what does business stand to gain? Why should busy HR departments get involved in the planning, preparation and feedback it entails? Benefits "One of the increasing benefits of placements for both parties is the opportunity for it to be a taster session with no commitment," says Heather Collier, manager of National Council for Work Experience. "University students can decide whether their chosen career is really for them, while employers can observe students in the work setting and offer places on graduate schemes or full time positions. It is a talent pipeline."... ...Tips for business So what other factors should businesses be aware of? "Choose appropriate projects and tasks," advises Neil Wilson, managing director of recruitment consultancy Badenoch & Clark. "Don't expose interns to your high risk accounts and make sure there is plenty of support in the team to monitor their progress and guide their day to day activities."... ...The implications for the HR manager are obvious. Meticulous planning is key, to give the placement structure, and it is also a good idea to get line management on board at an early stage. Suitable candidates for placements can then be chosen. Jason Pierce, managing director of online testing company Skillsarena, notes that organisations are often inundated with time-consuming applications. "When faced with such a scenario, it is often useful to assess the competencies of each candidate, especially in terms of their basic skills sets, such as proficiency in Microsoft Office applications, as well as spelling and grammar," he advises. Melanie Guy, HR Manager at software services provider Snowdrop, counsels businesses to allow the individual to take ownership of what they are doing to give them a sense of purpose, and to give and listen to feedback to find out what was enjoyable or not. "Don't take students on for too long if you haven't got enough meaningful work for them. That is not beneficial to either party," she warns. There is no doubt that work experience can be valuable, bringing significant benefits to business as well as giving young people 'employability', defined by Nick Chandler, Head of the CBI Work Experience project, as a set of attributable skills and knowledge that all labour market participants should possess to enable them to be effective in the workplace. So perhaps if employers haven't yet tried offering work experience, they should give it a go.