08-11-2010, 10:31 AM
This is particularly for a business owner or someone who is well versed on liabilities and tax.Most of you guys are pretty level headed.
I work for a manufacturer's rep in the construction industry. Me and the owner of my company were tossing around ideas on how to maximize getting additional help, without having to hire someone full-time. The company I work for is a small business.. that stays pretty busy.
The ideal situation would be to get a college intern.. but to be honest why would anyone want to intern at such a small business, even if they would get a very solid reference out of it from a very well connected person like our owner. Then I had an idea.
Our industry is very much about relationships, and is very stuctured. Architects/Engineers design the job, general contracotrs build the job and hire subs, the subs quote the job through supply houses, the supply houses go to the reps for the pricing from the factory. Along these lines everyone calls on each other and form relationships so that on bid day they are either 1) On the specification 2) Steer the job to their friends or people they trust 3) steer the job away from the people who they don't like. It is a very delicate balance, and one that takes a while to learn and can't be taught in college.
My idea was to offer a multi-company internship. We would partner with one of our Electrical Contractors, one of our General Contractors, and one of our Specifiers to offer an internship to a Construction Management student. This way they get to experience every realm of the construction world from the factory to Specification to the actual project management on the jobsite itself. The intern would spend one day a week at each different company. They would be trained on all aspects from quoting, project management, marketing, sales, and networking. The benefit for my company and the others is we get free help once a week, and more importantly form a new relationship every six months with a professional that will more than likely one day be involved in our industry.
If I were a student in this field I would see this as a dream internship.
The issue is I have NO CLUE how liability and insurance work and how the logisitics would play out. I don't know hwo this would affect each company from a tax perspective, if it offers tax incentives, or what kind of responsbilities each owner would have.
Can someone fill me in on whether this could work or not? I have never heard of an internship like this so I would like to learn what we would have to do to put this in motion.
Thanks in advance!
I work for a manufacturer's rep in the construction industry. Me and the owner of my company were tossing around ideas on how to maximize getting additional help, without having to hire someone full-time. The company I work for is a small business.. that stays pretty busy.
The ideal situation would be to get a college intern.. but to be honest why would anyone want to intern at such a small business, even if they would get a very solid reference out of it from a very well connected person like our owner. Then I had an idea.
Our industry is very much about relationships, and is very stuctured. Architects/Engineers design the job, general contracotrs build the job and hire subs, the subs quote the job through supply houses, the supply houses go to the reps for the pricing from the factory. Along these lines everyone calls on each other and form relationships so that on bid day they are either 1) On the specification 2) Steer the job to their friends or people they trust 3) steer the job away from the people who they don't like. It is a very delicate balance, and one that takes a while to learn and can't be taught in college.
My idea was to offer a multi-company internship. We would partner with one of our Electrical Contractors, one of our General Contractors, and one of our Specifiers to offer an internship to a Construction Management student. This way they get to experience every realm of the construction world from the factory to Specification to the actual project management on the jobsite itself. The intern would spend one day a week at each different company. They would be trained on all aspects from quoting, project management, marketing, sales, and networking. The benefit for my company and the others is we get free help once a week, and more importantly form a new relationship every six months with a professional that will more than likely one day be involved in our industry.
If I were a student in this field I would see this as a dream internship.
The issue is I have NO CLUE how liability and insurance work and how the logisitics would play out. I don't know hwo this would affect each company from a tax perspective, if it offers tax incentives, or what kind of responsbilities each owner would have.
Can someone fill me in on whether this could work or not? I have never heard of an internship like this so I would like to learn what we would have to do to put this in motion.
Thanks in advance!