Intern survey: a lot of home office, few social contacts

During the pandemic, numerous internships had to take place from the home office. Even if junior employees see the advantages – they don’t always want to work from home.

Those who completed an internship during the Corona pandemic often did so in their home office. This is the result of the “Future Talents Report 2022”, an annual survey by the management consultancy Clevis.

Almost three quarters (74 percent) of the more than 3,000 interns surveyed stated that they had worked from home in the past year.

At the beginning of 2020, the proportion was still 26 percent, a year ago it was 63 percent.

Home office with advantages – and difficulties

The interns also want this flexibility for their future working life.

They are in favor of hybrid forms of work and would like to spend a maximum of 55 percent of their working hours in the home office.

From the point of view of those surveyed, the greatest advantage of working from home is the time saved because there is no need to commute to work. 46 percent expressed their agreement with this. For almost a third (29 percent), more flexible work and leisure activities also play a role.

IT equipment could be improved

However, those surveyed also see problems when it comes to working from home.

About a third (27 percent) complained about the reduced social contacts with colleagues.

14 percent have difficulties with the distraction environment in their private lives.

Problems in separating work and private life mentally and physically were mentioned by a small proportion of those surveyed (12 percent).

Many interns gave their employers bad references when it came to digitization.

More than every second person (59 percent) thinks that the IT equipment was not up to date. Half (51 percent) also had the impression that their managers were not very willing to drive digitization forward.


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Salary level is the same – but so is overtime

According to the survey, the average monthly gross salary of interns is roughly at the level of previous years.

On average, the junior employees earned 1071 euros per month. In the “Future Talents Report 2021” the average salary was around 1067 euros per month.

The development seems less positive when it comes to the question of whether internships are paid at all. While 92 percent of the interns were still being paid in the previous year, 79 percent now stated that their internship was remunerated. 66 percent completed a mandatory internship, 34 percent a voluntary internship. The internships lasted an average of five months.

Overtime has also increased compared to the previous survey. Almost every second person (47 percent) stated that they regularly work overtime. In the previous year, the figure was 43 percent.

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