Leah Powell knew all the stereotypes.
Making coffee. Picking up dry cleaning. Sorting through lunch orders.
But after taking a summer internship at The Bonadio Group, the Rochester Institute of Technology graduate was given the opportunity to work one-on-one with one of the firm's partners on an important project for a local client.
Twenty-one years later, Powell still works at The Bonadio Group, and has ascended to the position of tax principal at the Perinton-based accounting firm.
"After my internship with Bonadio, I never did go out and intern with anyone else," said Powell, 44, of Honeoye Falls.
Attracting good employees is a huge priority for business leaders in virtually every industry, and a good internship program can do wonders to bridge the gap between talent-starved companies and the college graduates they crave.
At The Bonadio Group, more than 50 percent of new hires come through the firm's internship program. Xerox Corp., which in the past has averaged more than 200 students in its internship program each year, sees 59 percent of graduating interns accept jobs with the company, including new CEO Ursula Burns. And optics manufacturer Optimax Systems Inc. in Ontario, Wayne County, gets 25 percent of its new employees through summer internships or co-op programs.
"It's the most productive part of our pipeline," said Mike Mandina, president of Optimax.
As more colleges offer course credit for summer internships or require them as part of certain programs, many local businesses have responded with an increase in both the size and scope of their programs.
Xerox has interns work on future products and enhancements, and provides them with housing and rental cars to entice them to enlist.
Mandina, who founded the Finger Lakes Advanced Manufacturers' Enterprise, urges members of the group to commit to internship programs to show students the changing world of advanced manufacturing.
Rochester engineering firm Bergmann Associates revamped its internship program a few years ago and now runs a structured, 10-week program that includes a series of courses that expose students to many areas of engineering.
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"It gave me an idea of what kind of work I should expect when I get out of school, and it's definitely helped me understand the business side of it," Shreya Shah, 20, an intern at Bergmann, said this week. Her time with the firm has increased the chances that she'll look for employment there after she graduates from Syracuse University.
"It's given me more of a personal connection because I know a lot of people there," Shah said.
In Rochester, the ramping up of internship programs is also a response to what many business-people believe is a growing problem: the flight of area college graduates to other regions of the country.
"I've been recruiting for a long time, and there are so many people who leave Rochester when they first get out of college, and I think it's because they don't know any different," said Marianne Bittner, technical recruiter at Bergmann Associates.
Big-city lure
"Clearly, it's an issue for the community and for companies like ours, because when you've got talented people you'd like to keep them in your backyard," said Tom O'Brien, senior vice president of global human resources at Constellation Brands Inc., the Victor-based alcoholic beverages giant. Executives at other area companies echoed these sentiments, and the word on college campuses is much the same.
"A lot of people are saying they want to get out or get to a bigger city," said Rick Brienzi, a senior at St. John Fisher College who is interning at The Bonadio Group this summer. "It's not that Rochester is necessarily a bad place. They just want to try something different."
The recession isn't helping. Xerox has 108 interns this summer, fewer than half its long-term average, and Optimax, which employs 130 people, had only one part-time student employee this year, compared with 12 last year.
RIT, UR active
The cutbacks make continued school-to-business relationships even more important. RIT has one of the largest cooperative education programs in the country, and during the 2007-08 school year, the university partnered with 560 Rochester-area employers, placing 42 percent of the 5,333 co-op students in jobs at local firms.
More internship programs also are being established at the graduate level. Two years ago, Constellation Brands began a formalized program with The University of Rochester's William E. Simon Graduate School of Business Administration to get interns through the door each summer.
Such efforts seem to be working. Mark Zupan, dean of the Simon School, said that surveys conducted among students show that while only 10 percent come from the area, as many as 70 percent want to stay in town after they graduate.
Finding them jobs in the area is the hard part, so when a local company asks to partner, the schools are eager to participate.
"It's a great long-run play for the community," Zupan said. "Promote that kind of dating and you end up with positive outcomes."
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