Spotlight for Career Services Professionals
When it comes to selecting students for their internship and co-op programs, employers have a set of five competencies that are “must haves,” according to NACE’s 2017 Internship & Co-op Survey.
In the three years since this survey first asked about the competencies that are most important to employers when selecting students for their internship and co-op programs, five competencies have stood out as crucial for intern and co-op hires to possess. (See Figure 1 and Figure 2.) These include:
- Information processing;
- Teamwork;
- Planning/prioritizing;
- Decision making/problem solving; and
- Verbal communication.
In fact, at least 95 percent of employers responding to this question see information processing and teamwork as critical components of an internship or co-op recruit’s appeal.
NACE’s 2017 Internship & Co-op Survey was conducted from November 21, 2016, to February 17, 2017, from NACE employer members; there were 276 respondents, representing 26.4 percent of all eligible respondents. The 2017 Internship & Co-op Survey report is available to participants through MyNACE. An executive summary of the 2017 Internship & Co-op Survey is available on NACEWeb.
Figure 1: Preferred competencies for intern hires
| Competency |
2015 |
2016 |
2017 |
| % of respondents |
| Information processing |
95.6% |
94.4% |
98.7% |
| Teamwork |
96.9% |
94.9% |
94.9% |
| Planning/prioritizing |
92.6% |
93.5% |
89.7% |
| Decision making/problem solving |
90.4% |
84.6% |
89.7% |
| Verbal communication |
90.6% |
90.7% |
88.5% |
| Data analysis |
75.4% |
71.0% |
76.9% |
| Computer skills |
66.2% |
63.2% |
61.5% |
| Job-specific technical skills/knowledge |
58.3% |
58.4% |
51.3% |
| Written communication |
45.0% |
37.1% |
30.8% |
| Selling/influencing |
24.9% |
17.8% |
28.2% |
Source: 2017 Internship & Co-op Survey, National Association of Colleges and Employers
In this analysis, a criterion was defined as “important” if a respondent who used that criterion considered it either “very important” (4) or “extremely important” (5) on a 5-point scale.
Figure 2: Preferred competencies for co-op hires
| Competency |
2015 |
2016 |
2017 |
| % of respondents |
| Information processing |
94.3% |
95.9% |
100.0% |
| Teamwork |
96.7% |
95.9% |
94.9% |
| Planning/prioritizing |
93.4% |
89.7% |
91.0% |
| Decision making/problem solving |
87.6% |
85.4% |
89.7% |
| Verbal communication |
89.3% |
90.7% |
85.9% |
| Data analysis |
80.3% |
78.6% |
82.1% |
| Computer skills |
72.7% |
69.8% |
64.1% |
| Job-specific technical skills/knowledge |
69.2% |
66.7% |
57.7% |
| Written communication |
51.7% |
39.2% |
32.1% |
| Selling/influencing |
31.7% |
10.3% |
23.1% |
Source: 2017 Internship & Co-op Survey, National Association of Colleges and Employers
In this analysis, a criterion was defined as “important” if a respondent who used that criterion considered it either “very important” (4) or “extremely important” (5) on a 5-point scale.