Getting to know future trainees during the Easter vacations

Companies from Jena and the region wanted for the Jena Internship Week

After the successful premiere last summer, the Jena Economic Development Agency and various partners are inviting all Jena companies to take part in the next edition of "Internship Week Jena". During the Easter vacations, companies can introduce themselves and their professional offers to interested young people aged 15 and over directly in the company and thus get to know potential future trainees. In addition to the Jena/Saale-Holzland district craftsmen's association, the city of Jena and the employment agency, the photonics network OptoNet is also supporting the successful format this year.

"Jena offers a wide range of career prospects, from skilled trades to high-tech, and the best way to get to know this diversity is to do an internship here,"

says Wilfried Röpke, Managing Director of the Jena Economic Development Agency.

"Companies can now register online on the Jena Internship Week website and participate flexibly. The interested students are automatically 'matched' with the companies' offers according to their interests and talents."

Success story internship week 2021

According to Röpke, there is a particular shortage of skilled workers; the format offers the opportunity to get to know potential trainees in an uncomplicated way through a one-day internship.

"Last year, 60 companies registered and over 110 pupils took the opportunity to 'get a taste' of a wide range of professions in Jena on a total of 132 internship days."

Such direct contact is important in order to create realistic expectations of the future job.

A kind of professional speed dating that pays off for the companies, as personnel officer Franziska Serfling from ASI Jena GmbH knows:

"We took part in the internship week during the 2021 summer vacation and met a nice young man during the one-day internship who has since started his apprenticeship as an electronics technician for energy and building technology with us."

According to Serfling, it is an advantage for companies to get to know pupils outside of a traditional job interview.

"The young people accompanied our fitters to the construction sites and in customer service. This allowed both sides to get to know each other in everyday working life."

District craftsmen's association and OptoNet are involved as partners

A concept that is particularly important in the skilled trades. This is confirmed by Manuela Vogt, project manager for the Jena/Saale-Holzland district skilled crafts association:

"Getting a taste of it early on is and remains the best self-test for young people. What can I do with my own hands, what prospects does vocational training offer? After all, you don't necessarily need a high school diploma or university degree to realize your potential. It also allows the companies to get to know you personally."

According to Vogt, "hands with brains" are required in all modern trades today. This opens up a wide range of opportunities for further development in terms of craftsmanship and technology as well as business succession.

For the photonics network OptoNet, practical experimentation is also the proverbial "be-all and end-all" when it comes to recruiting young talent for a company in the long term. According to OptoNet Managing Director Nora Kirsten, the industry is desperately looking for precision opticians, physics laboratory technicians and microtechnologists, for example.

"The professions in the high-tech photonics sector are often not so well known - which is why we find matching via the platform ideal. The photonics companies in Jena are looking forward to welcoming the students and will show them what future topics they are researching and working on."

All Jena companies are invited to take part in the internship week during the Easter vacations and present their own diverse career opportunities free of charge. Anyone who took part last year can log in with the familiar access data and post the current offers. The statistical evaluation from last year also shows that it is worth taking part: 100 percent of the students surveyed said they would recommend the internship week to others.