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May 31, 2024
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Both. anyone would much rather have both. Sure you can lean one more towards the other, but the ones that get return offers have quality and quantity.
So if you had an intern what do you tell the about quantity and quality?
Quality 100%.
STORY TIME - Just yesterday, I gave an intern a small project to do in which he'd create a financial chart and brief summary as part of a presentation deck. I gave him a half day to do it.
Dude returns the work product in an hour thinking he's hot shit.
The slide is filled with TONS of mistakes ranging from wrong numbers, horrible formatting, and a thoughtless financial summary. There was a sentence in there that said "revenue went up due to the company doing more business". What's worse is that before I even reviewed it, he's asking other analysts / associates around me what else he can start working on.
Had he just taken the time to use all the time allocated, he would have literally saved us both time. Mistakes happen, so I understand that. But his quality was careless, and his attempt to finish fast costs the team more time.
Trust me, while I understand speed is important, quality IMO is 10x more important when providing a work impression. Take your time to turn in a quality project. Speed will come naturally with more reps.
I would rather Quality over Quantity, but I would take a blend that favors quality over quantity. Or at least an intern with that mindset. Give me someone that wants to learn and improve, and I can work with that. Remember, these are interns. Not all of them have the experience, so it's about helping them get that experience in a constructive and positive fashion. Just to be clear where, when I say constructive, I mean giving them good feedback that they can learn from, and when I say positive, it means acknowledging the effort and highlighting what they did, both right and wrong. As much as interns are grunts, they are there to learn too. Show me you have the desire to learn and get things right, and both quality and quantity will come.
Quality. End of story. If you have high quantity but low quality, nobody will ever trust you and you won't get meaningful projects to do. Proving ability to produce quality work -> more quantity / responsibilities given to you over time.
Quality. After a year of analyst work, the typical efficient FT is 5-10x faster than an intern on making slides, but isn’t efficient at checking someone’s work. So to the extent an intern messes up a page, it often times takes almost as much time to review and correct as it does to just do the work themselves. So unless the page is near 100% correct, it adds little value to the FT
Quality where possible, but very often interns don't know anything and the only leverage I can get is to assign interns relatively mindless tasks. In which case, just get it done because not much of an opportunity to add value by pursuing quality.
Always ask when they need it. If they give you a deadline, then do your best within that time frame (not much value in turning in work early if you could've made it better).
OTOH if they just say ASAP, then put a little more emphasis on speed per my first paragraph.
I think I can add to this.
Of course, the ideal would be someone who can pump quality and quantity at the same time but the truth such interns are a rare find, and if they do end up returning full-time, they are usually rock stars.
Back when I was an analyst (at a BB in top-tier group), I had a summer analyst working with me on a deal. The guy was nice, and we're still in contact, but he was terrible then. He wouldn't say no to anyone and to compound that he was also slow, so his output was usually below par (ie filled with mistakes). Initially, I would get pissed but I never showed it because i didn't want to wreck his confidence (we've all been there).
Mid-way during internship, I took him out for a drink and conveyed some actionable feedback. Didn't do much benefit as he kept on making mistakes. The guy was super hard working though, consistently working till wee-hours in the morning. He was from Korea; had spent time in the military and wouldn't get stressed out easily...when it came to review time, I got a couple of associates and one VP on board, and went batting for him. he got the offer, and returned full-time...anyway long story but the moral of the tale is that sometimes being hardworking and showing the right attitude can just be what you need to get the offer as ppl really appreciate it
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