Assuming this is true, is anyone surprised this event happened or by how it played out?
“The next day, all of us who signed the petition were called into a meeting where we thought our proposal would be discussed. Instead, we were informed that due to our “unprofessional” behavior, we were being let go from our internships. We were told to hand in our ID badges and to gather our things and leave the property ASAP.”
The response in the article seems pretty spot on. If you are an intern, you are there to learn, not to influence corporate policy; you knew about the dress code before you accepted the internship, so there should be no surprise there.
This seems like a non-story to me, personally. If you’re an intern, you follow company policy. If you are a new hire, you follow company policy. If you are someone who has built up respect among your peers and supervisors, THEN you can feel some liberty to question policies, but in a professional manner.
A petition is not professional and does not belong in a corporate environment except insofar as it relates to basic workers’ rights (if you are forced to work overtime without enhanced pay, a petition may be worthwhile, since the Department of Labor would provide backing if you receive punishment for asking your company to follow the law). If you disagree with a corporate policy, it is your duty as an employee or an intern to learn about it before doing anything else.
If you have a problem with something, there is a chain of command through which you can voice concerns. When you circumvented that chain of command, you undermined your ability to be perceived as thoughtful employees, which made you expendable.
So, to the subject of the article, you just earned a lesson of corporate employment: Actions, when not thought through fully, have consequences, some of which are severe.
Not knowing the contents of the petition, I have no way of judging whether the interns were “unprofessional” or the managers are jerks. All the latter had to do was say “No.” Now, if the petition was in the nature of a demand rather than a joint request, I’d agree with @chrisw.
It was unprofessional to submit a petition. @chrisw is SPOT ON.
“If you are an intern, you are there to learn, not to influence corporate policy; you knew about the dress code before you accepted the internship, so there should be no surprise there.”
Good for the company. I’m surprised that only one intern was smart enough not to sign. I question whether this is even a true story because it seems unrealistic that a whole group of lemmings, I mean interns, would have gone down this path. My kids and their peers aren’t that clueless.
Internships are all about learning and it sounds like these interns learned a very important lesson: The workplace isn’t a democracy. Second lesson: As a temporary intern, your opinion really doesn’t matter. Third lesson: Being professional counts. If you can’t be professional about conduct in the office, why should a company trust you to work for them and represent them as an employee?
“The worst part is that just before the meeting ended, one of the managers told us that the worker who was allowed to disobey the dress code was a former soldier who lost her leg and was therefore given permission to wear whatever kind of shoes she could walk in. You can’t even tell, and if we had known about this we would have factored it into our argument.”
Love this part I quoted. “would have factored it into are argument” not realized you didn’t have an argument? Not that some employee’s personal health matters should have been discussed with any of the interns before hand.
There are several things that interns should know before entering a workplace environment 1. Know your role and place within the organization. 2. Maintain appropriate boundaries 3. Your actions have consequences . One of the most important things a parent can teach a child is life is not always fair, adapt as necessary .
There is more than one managerial style. One of my former staffers called mine “the iron fist in the velvet glove.” In the context of this thread, I would say that the interns were miles away from the fist. I would have read the petition; I would probably have said no; I would not have terminated them.
Word will get back to the colleges that these interns came from (I’m making the assumption that these are college students). I wonder about the quality of the interns this company will get in the future. They may get sheep; I doubt that they will get independent thinkers.
For all of you who think that this is perfectly normal, acceptable, and even praiseworthy, I can only say that I am glad I do not work for you. I am glad I do not work for this company. I am glad I have never worked for a company, a firm, or an institution that would treat even the lowliest of its employees (and I’m going to include interns in that category) this way.
Or they may not get spoiled entitled interns from that college either.
One student on a college coop started a thread on the school’s reddit forum saying how mean his boss was because he was not allowed to take time off when he wanted to take it and had to get the mean boss’s approval first. Imagine!!! The student also used his real name on reddit. His coop job was terminated.
Seriously, how is a polite memo insubordination?
Now, if the request was phrased as a demand, or phrased as a petition, then sure, that’s unprofessional. But if it was a “We, the undersigned, would like to enter into a conversation about the possibility of changing the dress code”, then what exactly is the problem?
This is why I’m with @AboutTheSame on this one, at least for the moment—without knowing the content of the letter, I refuse to leap to thinking it was unprofessional or otherwise termination-worthy.
Also, where was the internship coordinator in this conversation? At least in internship programs I’ve been involved in from the academic side, perceived unprofessional behavior on the part of interns needs to be discussed with the interns and the coordinator, even if only to say “Look, make sure to prep them better.”
But firing all of them on the spot? It makes me wonder if there’s more backstory—that seems pretty extreme, if that was the first problem the company had had with their interns.
Or maybe it was the last straw!
The “Ask a Manager”'s answer was pretty good-firing them all was too extreme, but the interns displayed a total lack of judgment. As an intern, you’re only going to be there a short time, and the goal is to learn the business and impress the bosses(so you can get a job at graduation, if you want one). It’s impossible to determine what industry the intern is writing about, but at approximately 99% of the industries out there, the dress code is the single least important part of the job. For this intern to focus on that-well, it provides two valuable life lessons-a. always think things through and b. actions have consequences.
@crankyoldman [how did I not pick that name?] : I’m with you partway. I think the managers missed the opportunity for a teaching moment – and, if they’re not interested in those, why are they having interns? I want to increase my pool of potential future job applicants who already have a sense of our processes and procedures – not toss them out the window.
It would be interesting to know at what point of the internship this was presented. If it was presented early on , it may not have been well received. If it was later after relationships had been established , the response may not have been so drastic . My other concern as an employer would be what weren’t they doing that they were supposed to be doing while they took the time to organize and develop this petition?
Well, I’m a softie, so I too would have viewed it as a proverbial “teachable moment.” But we don’t know all the facts; if the interns wasted a lot of time on this issue, I can understand why an employer would be upset.
I would not assume they did it on office time rather than their own time. Now, if the petition showed up on the company server, that might be a terminable offense in itself. Even then, I think I’d say teachable moment. Here is something you do not do. Not – there’s the door; don’t let it hit you on the way out.
The company probably had plenty of kids available to replace the insurgents. I use the term lightly. If this us true, the petition was a pretty dumb and self serving move for newbies.
Btw, my first corporate position was for a co which had a strict dress code. Mess up once, get sent home to change. Second time, no discussion. And this wasn’t “front office.”. Their business, their rules.
The article was clear that it was proffered as a petition. A petition in their situation is wholly and completely inappropriate.
While I do think an organized petition was an extreme measure driven by poor judgement, the company itself has a lesson to learn from it. We have a new generation entering the workforce, with new ideals and expectations. If a company wants to retain the best and brightest after spending time and money to teach and develop them, it is going to have to understand and respond to generational diversity. Micromanagement is a time-waster, resulting in reduced creativity, engagement, and productivity. While I understand a company’s effort to retain a professional image, holding on to old school values (“do as you’re told because we said so”) will only turn away young and budding talent.
I’m not saying to give in to whatever the younger generation wants, but rather to pick your battles and respond appropriately. Explain the “why” behind decisions, and if there isn’t a good enough explanation, then be willing to listen to your team and make changes.
As someone else said, a tightly managed company will likely end up with a lot of sheep and no visionaries, suffocating or driving out any creative and forward-thinking talent that is necessary to keep the business growing. Change is inevitable and required to maintain success in a rapidly evolving world.
I contracted at an investment bank for two years recently, and got to wear jeans twice in that whole time. Word was that even when you came in on a Saturday, you couldn’t wear them – top management rule. I never came within miles of a customer. No way would I have even considered asking for a looser dress code. We had interns – as far as I know, they didn’t complain. Grow up – it is the world of adult work.
Nova, I’m all for a good protest. But as things still stand, there are few situations where a green intern can presume to know more than the folks who built and run the company.
Dress code isn’t what makes sheep. That’s a superficial. I’m hard pressed to see how this petition is visionary. We have no background on this incident. Not sure I even believe it.
Saying the company should stop the wheels to explain to Bobby or Susie why they already responded with a No sounds snowflakey.