Hiring Interns

searcher profile

September 09, 2021

by a searcher from Babson College - F.W. Olin Graduate School in Syracuse, NY, USA

Outside of having the intern sign an NDA and clearly outlining in the offer letter the confidentiality of the information they'll have access too, has anyone done anything else to protect yourself? Background checks? If so, which service did you use?

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commentor profile
Reply by a searcher
from IE Business School in Cambridge, UK
If someone is interning for a search fund they’re not going to actively look to burn bridges. And realistically speaking if they broke the NDA or whatever, most likely they’re a university student with little to sue for plus would be waste of your funds as a searcher.

Just be selective with information you share and have them work on tasks that are less value add but more time intensive - bespoke industry research, compiling lists of potential targets and getting contact details, and once they’ve proven themselves to be dependable, let them build a financial model.

Background checks, NDAs, etc, sound like excessive overkill for an unpaid intern.
commentor profile
Reply by a searcher
from University of California, Berkeley in Bend, OR, USA
Agreed. We managed a fairly large intern team with some very bright undergrads and MBAs. While I guess there is always a "risk", I'd say the folks looking for internships from some of the top schools self-select for not being malicious.
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