There may have been a record number of applications for the summer placements with IT companies organised through MITA, but Microsoft Malta was very disappointed with the number of applicants for its winter internships.
Few people realise that it could take six months or more for a new graduate to reach the performance levels of his or her colleagues
“I think that the internship model is perhaps not as appreciated in Malta as it is elsewhere. Placements are mostly seen as a way of earning money in summer, and not as a way of getting invaluable work experience that bridges the gap between what you learn and the realities of the workplace,” Microsoft Malta country manager Adrianna Zammit lamented.
“Having an internship with a recognisable name like Microsoft makes you much more employable. Few people realise that it could take six months or more for a new graduate to reach the performance levels of his or her colleagues.”
Microsoft Malta offered five openings last winter but only two of the 50 students at the University’s ICT faculty were interested, she said.
The internships are offered as part of Microsoft Malta’s outreach programme, which is active in several spheres. The most visible of these is the Microsoft Innovation Centre at Skyparks, an “incubation” centre where start-ups – mostly but not exclusively IT-related – can literally “plug-in and play”, saving considerable amounts on overheads at a time in their business development when every euro counts. There are over 100 MICs around the world.
“We offer desks and offices, telecommunication services, computers and space on the Cloud through our partner BMIT, and the all-important mentoring,” she said.
The centre is still developing and the company intends to review its approach with time, both with regards to the type of start-ups it will accept as well as to the time limits it will impose on them.
At the moment, there are eight companies using the premises.
The centre, opened last February, is also one of the partners (along with Allied Newspapers and the University) in PwC’s €1 million fund, which is offering pro-bono services to start-ups. The collaboration means the start-ups using the centre can also tap into the fund, meaning that the overheads in their first year can be reduced to virtually payroll and operational costs.
The centre is also used to promote another aspect of the outreach programme: the promotion of IT as a career. This involves working with younger and younger students as Ms Zammit believes that it is important to get children to appreciate the wide variety of careers available.
“It is not about writing computer programming or about repairing computers!” she said. The centre recently hosted an ICT Career Day for women, which was opened by Parliamentary Secretary Edward Zammit Lewis.
The centre also hosts courses on the latest technology – especially cloud-computing, which is expected to generate some 14 million jobs by 2015.
Clearly, Microsoft’s outreach is not completely philanthropic: It is exposing students and entrepreneurs to its range of products and services in the hope of generating future loyal customers. But it is investing a considerable amount of money into the sector, which will benefit all those that it touches, as well as the Maltese economy as a whole, she said.
“We are the only software company in Malta which has a sizeable direct presence, rather than just one through a reseller or agent. We feel that as a major multinational company, this is very much our role,” she said.