TIRED OF WORKING FOR FREE? GET TOUGH – OR GET OUT OF THERE
Working for free – and running out of cash, fast? You’re not alone. In a graduate job market as tough as today’s, thousands of graduates are finding themselves working for free indefinitely – hoping their boss will offer to pay them one day… Some day…
Although unpaid interns are often characterised as ‘rich kids’ with endless funds from The Bank of Mum and Dad, Graduate Fog knows this is rarely the case. More often, unpaid interns are working two jobs, sleeping on a friend’s floor and paying for everything by credit card. They’re skint – and knackered.
“How do I turn my unpaid internship into a paid job?” is one of the most common questions graduates ask (alongside “Are unpaid internships legal?” – which they’re not, usually). We say: you have more power than you think you do. So STOP THE MADNESS. Take charge. The bad news is that this means taking action – and being a teensy bit braver than you actually feel (we know working for free can squish your confidence – that’s normal).
The good news? If you can push through that discomfort, you’ll discover that doing something is far more likely to result in a paid job than staying put and simply crossing your fingers.
The other good news is that you’ll start to feel more in control again. By following these steps, you’ll find the facts you need and create a plan that works for you this time. After all, if your current employer doesn’t value you enough to pay you a wage, you need to know that – even if it hurts. Why? So you can stop wasting your time and find another employer who does value your contribution. Remember: they may be too cheap to reward you financially for your work – but other employers will have more sense (and more money). So go and find them.
Tanya de Grunwald, founder of Graduate Fog and author of How to Get a Graduate Job Now, shows you how to turn your unpaid internship into a paid job…
1) Pick your internship wisely. “Not all internships are equal. Make sure there is a prospect of a job at the end of the internship. Employers that run a ‘revolving door’ internship system are less likely to hire you at the end. Ditto if you’re one of many. Look for placements where you’re the only intern as you’ll have a chance to make more of an impact. Always ask when they last took on an intern in a paid capacity at the end of their placement.”
2) Impress. “Working for a crummy wage sucks, but if you’re going to gain anything from your internships you have to behave as if you’re being paid. Learn to anticipate what needs to be done, and suggest doing it before they ask (but don’t do it before they ask, as that can make managers jumpy). You want them to think ‘Wow, she’s really good. I’d miss her if she wasn’t there.’ Once that happens, you’re in a stronger position to negotiate.”
3) Line up other options. “Eggs and baskets, people. Of course, you want this to turn into a paid position, but hope can be a dangerous thing for interns – as it leaves you vulnerable. Always assume you’ll be leaving, so line up something else to go to, even if it’s another unpaid internship. This will give you some bargaining power if your current employer wants to keep you on, especially if your next internship is with their main competitor. They really hate that.”
4) Stick to the time limit. “Never agree to do an internship indefinitely or ‘see how it goes’. Having a clear end date keeps the relationship professional. When it’s approaching, arrange a meeting with your supervisor. Say that you’ve had a great time and learned loads, but you need to move on as you need to find some paid work. Ask them for a reference and to keep you in mind if any paid positions come up.”
5) Negotiate — or walk away. “If they ask you to stay, you’ve made an impact and you’re in a strong position to negotiate a better deal. If you’ve been working unpaid, ask for the living wage (so you can settle on the minimum wage if they won’t stretch to that — but request a review in two months’ time and ask for the living wage again then). If they claim to have ‘no budget’, say that’s a shame but you’ll have to move on. If they really want to keep you, they’ll try and find the money. If they don’t, walk away. Give them a chance to miss you. If they want you back, they’ll call.”
…AND ONE LAST THING! Done an unpaid internship that led nowhere? You can claim back pay for the time you worked there (around £800 per month if you worked full-time). To find out how, contact our friends at the campaign group Intern Aware, who will guide you through the process, free of charge (seriously – they just love doing it!). Can’t afford to intern unpaid but want to help get the practice stamped out? You can help by reporting adverts for dodgy-sounding internships you see advertised. Again, contact Intern Aware for details.
* DID YOU TURN YOUR UNPAID INTERNSHIP INTO A PAID JOB?
Or are you struggling to do that at the moment? Share your experiences – good and bad – below…
Trivial Question…if, when you apply for a job, the employer offers the job but refuses to pay their way, given them a wide birth. That way, you dont end up working for free, you dont end up being complicit in deceit and supporting organisational practises which are tantamount to Tax Evasion/Fraud,
@Eowyn So, what was the question? 😉 Sorry, no, I think I get your point… Are you saying that if young people stopped agreeing to work for free, then the problem of unpaid internships would be solved instantly? Or that interns who accept unpaid positions are actually part of the problem? Of course, both could be said to be true… But unfortunately the very nature of vulnerable workers (as interns are) is that they are not in a position to negotiate (the same is true for migrant workers, care workers and other low paid workers). This is EXACTLY what the NMW law was set up for – to protect workers who are not in a position to negotiate themselves a good deal.
Unpaid internships do work! Here’s how it worked out for me in a 5 year degree:
High School:
discovered the career path I wanted to take, and did an extra-curricular business program that has since closed for lack of government funding.
Year 1:
Unpaid internship at company A organised by mentor from high school business program. Ends after restructure lays off most of the department.
Year 3:
Unpaid internship at company B organised by my university, in the same field as company A.
Retained on a series of rolling 3 month contracts afterwards.
Year 4:
Contact from company A puts me in touch with company C, which offers a paid internship.
Retained on a casual basis afterwards.
Continue working for company B.
Year 5:
Contract at company B allowed to run out following another restructure.
Find another 9 month contract at company B.
Apply for company B’s graduate scheme(permanent full time) and get accepted. Beat out several hundred other applicants for the role.
Quit company C after hiring and training replacement.
Note: both unpaid internships were insured and approved by my university, so no recovery of wages would be available (nor would I want to).
The funny thing is I had the luxury of knowing what I wanted to do in High School, and it still took 5 years of focus and discipline to land a graduate scheme position.
The best piece of advice is to work bloody hard at your internship and impress a senior manager(s) so much that they will go out of their way to mentor you and bat for you.
Happy hunting!
So to break it down mathematically over the 5 years:
(1 x high school activity) + (2 x unpaid internships) + (1 x paid internship) + (8 x 3 month contracts) + (1 x ongoing casual contract) + (1 x 9 month contract) + (3 x extra-curriculars) + (2 x Bachelors Degrees (2:1 equivalent)) = 1 graduate scheme position.
Note: I probably could have landed more offers if I tried but I was so sick of the process that I withdrew from all my outstanding applications when I got the first offer!
I am currently employed as an office manager at a small company. 95% of the time we look into our pool of previous interns when filling a position. We have seen how they work and how well they can fit into our office.
I started out as an unpaid intern (2 months) and was hired shortly after as a part time admin assistant. This allowed me to support myself through out uni and I worked full time during the summers.
If you can afford to do it I would encourage to do an internship, even if it is unpaid. And do it well! Even if you don’t get a job out of it (if there simply aren’t any) you can still get an amazing reference. I am always happy to give glowing references to good interns – and this can make a huge difference when looking for paid work.
I would second the notion that you should not work for free for an extended period of time – I think even 3 months is way too long!
Yesterday I was rejected from a paid internship with a group I am already volunteering for (the CAB). The experience they were demanding seems to only be obtainable by being given a chance in the first place.
I’m at a bit of a loss where to go from here. Obviously volunteering is better on the CV than nothing but I can’t just volunteer for months on months in the hope that a paid position might come of it. I also feel a bit of mug essentially working for free for an organisation that clearly doesn’t value what I’m doing.
Oh and deep down I’m not sure I’m enjoying the volunteering that much. I just feel I have to do something so as to have an answer to “and what are you currently doing?” which isn’t “sitting on jobsites sending CVs into a black hole”.
@Daniel, in terms of unpaid volunteering stints my opinion is that if
(a) you’ve learnt all the skills and knowledge you could gain from the organisation, and
(b) they’ve made it clear they won’t pay you,
then you should at least guilt trip them into giving you a glowing reference and then walk away to greener pastures.
Volunteering is part of my agreement with the Job Centre so I’m not even sure I’m allowed to leave and in any case it wouldn’t be wise to do so before I’ve found something else as then you walk into interviews with even less authority. It is just a complete kick in the teeth. I was starting to think of the stuff I could buy with an actual wage packet…
Imagine being in such a weak position in the labour market to be rejected for an internship for an organisation you already give up your time to in a capacity that very much feels like a job just without any pay.
I signed on next to someone smelling of urine last week. I just wake up asking how did this happen to me?
@Daniel might be worth trying out the Graduate Fog jobs board if you haven’t yet already?
It promises a response to every application and the employers there might be a bit more generous than the norm.
If you really need some cash quick it might be worth tutoring some high school and uni students.
Thanks but many of the jobs on the GF job board are ones I’m genuinely not qualified for as they are in different industries. That said I do need to get a job quickly. I have about c. £1800 to my name and I need to start building up savings.
I can quite understand why employers would be reticent to employ me given the amount of time I’ve been out of work. I thought all this voluntary work would demonstrate to employers that I do want to work. However, I fear it sends out an entirely different message.
I’m getting really bad chest pains as every set back increases the risk of a sanction which would potentially involve 3 months without £73 a week dole money. I just can’t believe I’m typing this having gone to uni and bagged a First. How is this happening to me?
What field are you looking to enter if you don’t mind me asking?
Might be worth joining your field’s professional association, heading along to a few networking events, building a rapport with the people you meet and trying to get a bit of work experience out of them. If you’re working for free the downside for them is quite limited.
Also it’s much harder to reject a person in front of you than it is to reject just another CV out of dozens.
I got a politics degree. How wise that decision was is a debate for another day 🙂
I originally wanted to do something with that. I went and did an internship for an MP. Tried to get into Labour politics and then public affairs which is so highly competitive I realise it was chasing a dream. I also applied to anything vaguely related to my discipline: Civil service, quangos, councils. etc The usual destinations of humanities grads.
These days I’ve also been concentrating on the charity sector based on the volunteering I’m doing. Campaigns/research/policy. Again highly competitive. Even various admins roles are rejecting me. Not sure how much this volunteering is valued. Why pay for something when you can get it for free? Again a competitive sector but then what isn’t these days?
I live in suburban Essex and I miss London and commuting and going on the tube and going for a beer in the pubs off of Liverpool St off a Friday night before racing for the last train home.
The only graduates I know working as paid staffers led the student equivalent of the party faction their MP is associated with.
The only paid charity graduate I met was at an assessment centre. She had spent 3 years volunteering before they finally caved in and started paying her.The pay was so low that she was looking to leave the sector – hence her presence at the assessment centre.
Looks like you’ll be in for an extended wait if you continue to pursue those sectors, but you never know your lucky break could be just around the corner.
Might be worth looking at admin roles outside the charity sector and call centre work at least to pay the bills for the time being.
Yeah Looking back I was chasing roles that were simply too competitive regardless of the recession. When you graduate with a First from a Russell Group uni you can start to believe your own hype.
I’ve lowered my sights since then. The council’s housing dept. Roles dealing with the letters at OfCom. Admin roles in various charities. Admin roles generally. Housing associations. Entry level civil service posts. Internships. If people want to accuse me of snobbery I’ve been rejected from Asda, Argos and WH Smiths as well. That was disclosing my degree though as I can’t realistically take it off the CV without that causing more problems than it solves.
The feedback from my last two interviews is that I did not match my skills and experience to the job description. It is more a case of not having the requisite experiences to draw upon in the first place. Hence I would happily work for three for a couple of months if there was guarantee of progression.
A prolonged period of unemployment has also had a pretty deleterious effect on my mental health which I’m not sure is helping anything. How well am I coming across?
To be honest you come across as a bit anxious and desperate (which is perfectly understandable), but still able to conduct a thorough job search.
Graduate job hunting absolutely sucks, but I can tell you from experience that when you finally get the offer all those feelings will vanish instantly.
How has the rest of your graduating class been going? Are there many in the same boat as yourself? Might be worth getting in touch with a few classmates who were in a similar situation to you, and asking them how they got their lucky break. They’d probably be a bit more sympathetic coming from the same place…
I have the threat of a sanction hanging over me. I do feel anxious. Not that employers would regard it as a desirable trait. I’m not in touch with any of my old classmates as dole money does not really allow you to have a social life. I just need someone to give me a chance not that that is how the world works.
@Daniel
Did you study politics at Nottingham by any chance? Think I saw your posts on another forum.
Nope although I guess my username is pretty generic. Best of luck with your job search!
@Daniel:
I have a Politics with International Relations degree from Aston Uni, Birmingham. I stayed in the city after uni, and have alternated between near minimum wage agency work in admin and the dole – I’m starting a new job on Monday.
I did try for things like Foreign Office Fast Stream, but in retrospect London’s rents are so high I think even on a Fast Streamer salary I’d have struggled there. Birmingham is survivable on £12-15k if you rent a room and have a bus pass.
And I certainly couldn’t work for nothing for an MP or the Labour Party.
In the run up to May I did some volunteering for the Green Party and stood in the local elections though so I have finally done something to do with my degree. It’s just very unlikely to ever pay any money.
@Daniel:
Are you on the Work Programme or similar then if you can’t leave your volunteering? Touch wood I’ve avoided that so far.
Having positive £1800 is better than the debt I – and I suspect most – unemployed people are in, but yes that won’t last long. Are you renting or living with parents?
No. I’m not on the Work Programme. Luckily I am some way off that. The volunteering is part of my “claimant commitment” though.
The point I was getting at was I can’t leave because it would only weaken my position in the labour market. Companies don’t employ people “doing nothing”. I’m not supposed to breach client anonymity and all that but I had a client at our bureau who had been on JSA for two years. Nothing on the CV at all for that period. Unsurprisingly employers were running a mile! I am learning stuff at Citizens Advice and a job may come of it once I’m trained up so I might as well keep doing it.
Yes £1800 isn’t the greatest bank balance. Better than the debt clients I see though. There are people in worse situations. I’m living at home so no rent costs. I am walking everywhere so no transport costs and good for my waistline. The £73.10 p/w JSA is going into my bank and I’m not spending a penny of it at the moment. When I get a job I want to save incredibly hard. The one lesson of the recession for me is if you have savings you can weather the storm.
“The volunteering is part of my ‘claimant commitment’ though.”
Oh I’ve been lucky with my Job Centre when I sign on between agency work – which can be anything from weeks to several months.
They usually leave me alone when I produce my list of 30+ applications/job seeking activities each fortnight.
Though I did some volunteering in the run up to the election.
They have been fairly lenient so far and tend to go after those who are clearly not making any effort. The fact that I am volunteering appears to make me the “deserving poor” in their eyes. That said being on JSA isn’t a situation I wish to be in for much longer and sanctions are an every present risk. I had two hours sleep before my last sign on. Perhaps the actual risk of a sanction is lower than my perceived risk of getting one but the prospect of my income dropping to £0.00 is pretty alarming.
I am not actually sure that being a Generalist Adviser at CAB is a great match for my skill set. I’m good at stuff like helping someone with “special needs” write a “Mandatory Reconsideration” letter but completely out of my depth on stuff like employment law and messy separations. It is more stressful than all the paid jobs I’ve had and as a volunteer I’m acutely aware that I’m not so integral to anything so as to justify paying.
Tayna has been kind enough to send me a copy of ‘How to get a graduate job…’. Any job would be nice! She has been a vocal campaigner against unpaid internships but my view is that not doing ANYTHING makes you unemployable pretty quickly and if you’re not in work a refusal to do an unpaid internship could damage your prospects of any employment.
@Daniel:
“The volunteering is part of my ‘claimant commitment’ though.”
If you’re potentially threatened with destitution (though not homelessness in your case at least) for not doing it, it isn’t really “volunteering” is it though?
I generally get to the Job Centre rather early before my appointment to avoid as much as possible any risk of being sanctioned.
@Daniel surely your CAB experience qualifies you for basic call centre work i.e. customer service, telesales, fundraising, complaints handling, etc.
Those places have very high turnover and are always hiring large tranches of people.
Recently, at a predictably rare job appointment at a TV company the interviewer asked me: ‘Why do you want to work here?’ And I gave what I thought was the correct answer; I said: ‘To earn a living; I have to get money so I can buy food, pay the mortgage, provide for my family, get out of debt perhaps..? To justify five years of expensive studying and several back-breaking work experience placements..? Maybe even start contributing to my pension..?’ My interviewer, a young woman maybe in her early thirties looked at me as if I was some kind of cheeky alien mercenary. She said: ‘Have you got those sort of responsibilities..?’ Feeling ever so slightly offended I didn’t answer. She continued: ‘At your age I’m surprised.’
‘And jealous,’ she may as well have added, clearly envious of my apparent responsibilities at home. I’m literally a good ten years older than what she obviously thought I was, but having filled out the notorious Equal Opportunities Monitoring form that explained that the company does not discriminate on grounds of age it shouldn’t have been an issue.
Luckily for my sake, also sat across from me was a considerably older man who hadn’t yet said a word. He can’t have been far from retirement himself and took no such offence at my expectations since he suddenly announced that young men of my generation had every right to earn enough to enjoy those sort responsibilities. In his words they were ‘just natural’. He then immediately took over the conversation telling me about the days in the industry when he was a young man benefiting greatly from the likes of affordable and rising house prices, free education and strong trade unions. The strong silent type, he’d obviously built his career in a different era and evidently, refreshingly, did not believe that the ladder of opportunity should have been pulled up after him. A certain generational tension was developing in front of me and while I’m sure that the woman did obviously understand the necessity of earning a living she clearly didn’t like the fact that I had been so blunt about being motivated by money. ‘You know we get a lot of CVs here from people who are motivated by passion…’ she began.
‘That’s good to hear,’ I replied, ‘but remember I’m professional, and to professionals emotions are irrelevant.’ At this point, some twenty minutes into the interview she hadn’t asked me anything about my talent, application or education. What only seemed to be of interest was my age, what baggage I carried in my personal life and then, quite predictably, if I would be interested in giving them productivity without charging for it in the form of one of their ‘new entrant trials’. Even though I was an employment applicant as advertised, for some reason she persisted for a while with a line of questioning about the possibility of me working unpaid: ‘It will be an opportunity for you to at least make contacts and have ‘our good name’ on your CV…?’
‘When my mortgage is paid off and my children are fully grown and I’ve got some spare time on my hands I might consider doing some volunteer work at Children In Need. Do you think Children In Need is a charity that deserves volunteers…?’ I calmly replied.
Having personally been suck in intern hell for the past few months I’d been practising that answer and finally took my opportunity to unleash it. She was stunned into silence but I didn’t feel guilty. No one likes to be told that they’re worthless or that companies are in fact quite entitled to break the law just because so many other people are apparently willing to offer their services for nothing. If you’re interested I don’t actually have a mortgage or children which for someone my age may not be especially unusual considering the lack of prospects offered by the current economy, but I do feel unfairly underdeveloped compared the president set and prosperity enjoyed by my parents’ generation who at a comparable age were generally and considerably more professionally and personally developed, despite not being nearly as well educated or indebted.
‘Tell me about a typical day…?’ I started, trying to steer things back onto safer, more polite ground since despite my offence, my heart, if now not my head entirely, was still genuinely attracted to the possibility of working in what they did. I was in fact quite passionate like all the other CVs but was quite determined not to show it and appear some gullible lapdog easily led into slavery.
‘There’s no such thing as a typical day. One day you could be required to work these hours and the next another set of hours. Would you be fine with that?’
‘Sure, if that’s what it says in the contract.’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘You know, if I sign a contract obliging me to work until say 5pm I’ll do that the best I can until then.’
‘You expect a contract?’
‘Is it not the law?’
‘Yes, of course. I am sorry.’ Awkward silence. ‘Though you understand that in such an unpredictable business things can change very quickly and that would of course be very difficult to specify contractually?’
‘Well then that’s subject to prior negotiation and the union agreed overtime rate of pay. Like they do at the department store, where I used to work.’
She didn’t like this, me implying that a retail store was better organised than her sophisticated TV company, and while again I wasn’t actually too concerned about contractual status I simply wanted her to know that I knew my rights. Now officially on the offensive I then asked if we could fast-rack to the details of ‘something useful’ – the salary. When there was one of course.
‘Very well,’ she rather stuttered. ‘Now I know that the starting salaries are quite modest but in a way we’re actually doing you a favour…?’
‘How do you mean?’
‘It’s the Student Loan thing to be precise; by paying our entry-level employees only a modest salary we think we’re kindly protecting them from the repayments…’
Now I honestly don’t want to dislike the behaviour of some employers but there can be no doubt that the ambition and passion of young applicants make them extremely vulnerable to what in many industries would be immediately identified as blatant exploitation. But they can obviously get away with it. Now perhaps to no great surprise I haven’t heard back from the interview but I’m not sorry for taking the opportunity to ask questions about exactly how I would benefit long term from following their protocol. Did anyone ever doubt that it’s becoming taboo to want to prosper, get old and responsible? Because if you do you’ll be quickly ruled out in favour of the next generation of cheap and over eager youngsters chasing the long promised promotions to stability that simply don’t exist. Suffering for your art is fine up to a point, but let’s not forget that for one or two people earning enough to live on could still be considered a necessity.
^Probably should have been less honest, lied your ass off and taken whatever opportunities you could to slack off on the job without being caught!
Wonderful article! Well turning an internship into full time job is really good for one candidate and actually a challenging task so it is very important to follow some ways to get convert internship into full time job. Thanks a lot!