Ask HN: How to Motivate Unpaid Interns?
one of the best luxuries we have as a startup in athens, ga is our access to UGA's 30k student body. we bring in 5-10 interns every semester at http://GoRankem.com (we have plenty more to choose from...), and best of all for a bootstrapped startup, the going rate around here is...nothing.<p>they're always super-excited when they come in, and despite telling them up front that i need self-motivated individuals that don't want to be micro-managed, the production tends to trail off unless i'm hands on and telling them what they need to do.<p>the best motivation i can point to is a former intern of ours busted his ass and we rewarded him with an equity stake moving forward.<p>what kind of motivation tactics of you used to increase productivity and get your interns/employees to try to best each other? any great ways to recognize great work that don't come off too cheesy?<p>-adam