PR Start by Nick Lucido

There has been a slew of articles and posts lately about unpaid internships, and it appears this topic is only snowballing. On Friday, there was a thoughtful article in the New York Times questioning whether the growth of unpaid internships in the past few years has been legal. It’s a discussion that has been occurring more frequently, especially within the public relations industry.

To fully disclose, I’m not a fan of unpaid internships and wish there were more paid opportunities for students, though I know some companies just can’t make an extra paycheck happen. I have not worked in an unpaid internship. Like the businesses I’ve worked for, I have tuition (which has been increasing since I arrived on campus) and rent to pay.

This section of the article is what I read several times over:

“Ms. Leppink said many employers failed to pay even though their internships did not comply with the six federal legal criteria that must be satisfied for internships to be unpaid. Among those criteria are that the internship should be similar to the training given in a vocational school or academic institution, that the intern does not displace regular paid workers and that the employer “derives no immediate advantage” from the intern’s activities — in other words, it’s largely a benevolent contribution to the intern.”

While I’ve read a couple of posts (Bill Sledzik and Heather Huhman come to mind as authors of this subject), this article reinforced my thoughts about how this directly impacts the public relations industry.

First, hundreds of agencies across the country utilize unpaid internships and many of these internships are essential to the business. However, if that unpaid intern is billed to clients for their hours work, is this illegal? The law appears to enforce this assertion. If this is true, this will have a huge impact on how many agencies run their business. Unfortunately, now isn’t a good time for this discussion to be happening. The recession hasn’t treated small shops well and I know many agencies have had to cut staff and benefits. By the way, many paid internships are among the victims of the recession.

Second, I wonder how this will impact public relations. How will the industry respond? Will this increase the number of paid internships? Reduce the number of unpaid internships? Will the quality of unpaid internships decrease? Right now, the answers to these questions are guesses at best. I think this topic will be discussed in the coming months.

My thought is that if this law is enforced, the quality of agency internships will decrease. If an unpaid intern can’t work on anything billable, interns will have to go back to fetching coffee and making copies. I find it hard to believe that every single unpaid internship out there now will immediately become a paid position. With more competition to find paid internships, this will then translate to a less prepared entry level.

So, should this law be enforced? It’s a tough question that’s part of an even larger discussion. The most important part of the discussion will be the task of trying to provide students with the right learning opportunities, yet making sure the right kind of compensation is returned. I know there are agencies out there who need the extra help and enjoy providing students the opportunity to learn, but should they be punished for their efforts?

What are your thoughts? Do you think this will have an impact on the public relations industry?

Photo by dborman2 on Flickr.