Last week, I had the pleasure of kicking off our intern program orientation.

It's one of my favorite things to do because every year our intern class gets stronger and stronger and I get to see it up close and personal.

But just a few short years ago we didn’t even have a program.  Sure, we had college students who came to work for the summer but it wasn’t part of a strategic talent management process. 

It was what most people in my role would call a “Friends & Family” program.

Today, we’ve made great strides. But we didn’t do it using the traditional campus playbook. Or falling prey to the “Intern Industrial Complex (IIC)”. 

What is the “IIC”?

It’s the feeling college recruiting teams get when they land on campus for fall recruiting season and feel like they have the smallest team, the weakest budget, and the lamest job fair booth.

Ever feel that way???

I’m guessing you have. And when that feeling kicks in, it causes you to increase your budget the next year to chase big sponsorships, get a bigger booth, deploy more people, and try to outcompete the big boys in the college space. 

It’s a nasty game. One that I’m not interested in playing.

PLAYING TO WIN WITHOUT BREAKING THE BANK

At Sheetz, we’re far from having the best early career program in the world. Every year; however, it gets better and better without expanding our budget. What we’ve discovered is that a good program is not about how many campus SWOT teams you have, how many classrooms you present to, or how fancy your booth is.

The Intern game is won or lost LONG before any of those things are in place. 

In my opinion, building a strong Intern recruiting program begins with strategy. In our case we use the “Play-to-Win Strategy" framework. 

If you’re not familiar with the Play-to-Win framework, it originated from the work of A.G. Lafley, former CEO of Procter & Gamble, and Roger Martin, then Dean of the Rotman School of Management.

Applied to your Intern program, the framework helps companies avoid the ICC vortex so they can carve out a competitive advantage -- where winning is on YOUR terms. It involves asking the following questions:

• What is your winning aspiration? What is the business reason for your program? What does "winning" look like?

• Where will you play? Where won’t you play? Which student segments, geographies, and schools will you focus on? And not focus on? Why?

• How will you win? What is your unique employee value proposition and competitive advantage in the areas you choose to play?

• What capabilities must be in place to win? What core competencies and activities are essential to execute your "how to win"?

• What systems are required? What resources, budgets, and conversion metrics will enable you to achieve your aspirations? 

When a campus team spends time getting the answers to these questions right, the likelihood of having a focused, successful program goes up tremendously. 

WHO’S WINNING THE INTERN GAME ANYWAY?

Over the last two weeks, I had three conversations with recruiting leaders who shared their frustration with the intern industrial complex. In their own way, they each said…

“We need a bigger budget, a bigger booth, more recruiters, and an earlier start or we won’t be able to compete with “Big Popular XYZ” company.“

The funny thing is, when you talk to “Big Popular XYZ” company, they’re scratching their heads too – saying the same thing about some competitor who they believe is beating them to all the talent. 

Everyone thinks they’re losing. 

So, in the end…who’s winning?

Well, for me, the recruiting leaders who are winning are the ones not playing the game at all. 

It’s the ones who decide what winning means to them in the first place – before they even step onto the field. 

So, Why Don’t Ivy League Interns Work at Gas Stations?

Maybe some Ivy League students do work at gas stations. I don’t know.

And I’m sure you know I have nothing against Ivy League students. It’s just a headline that helps me get more clicks. 😎

But truthfully, a Sheetz, we don’t typically hire Ivy League interns. Not because we don’t like really smart students from really great schools -- it’s because our Play-to-Win strategy has us focused on other colleges and universities.

To put it simply, there are a lot of great students from many great schools that don’t work for us.

And the reason why? 

👉🏽 It’s because they’re not on our target list. 

👉🏽 It’s because we value campuses in our retail footprint where our brand is strong.

👉🏽 It’s because we’re focused on converting Interns who really want to work for us because they’ve engaged with our business.

👉🏽 It’s because we’re focused on a small set of schools who we know and who know us.

Our 2025 intern class is the strongest we’ve ever seen not because we expanded our reach into new-and-better schools or because we spent more money on campus nice-to-haves... it’s because we doubled down on playing where our employee value proposition resonates the most with our target audience.

This results in us getting really great talent from a core thesis that great talent lives on any and every campus. 

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RELATED VIDEO

Watch this short video from the co-author of "Playing-to-Win", Roger Martin. It's oldy-but-goody. In just 7 minutes, he shares some great examples of how to deploy the framework.