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How students work from home in a summer internship during Covid-19

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HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 1

How students work from home in a summer internship during Covid-19

May Mei Ling WONG1, Ka Hing LAU2, and Chad Wing Fung CHAN2

1
Associate Professor, Department of Management, Lingnan University
2
Senior Project Officer, Office of Service-Learning, Lingnan University

Author Note

May Mei Ling WONG: ORCID: 0000-0003-3325-4368; Email: wongml@ln.edu.hk;

Ka Hing LAU: ORCID: 0000-0002-7255-186X; Email: khlau2@ln.edu.hk

Chad Wing Fung: ORCID: 0000-0003-1246-7495; Email: wfchan@ln.edu.hk

We have no known conflict of interest to disclose

Mailing address of the principal author: Room SEK102/5, the Department of

Management, Lingnan University, Tuen Mun, Hong Kong. Tel: +852 2616-8318

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HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 2

Abstract

Background: Covid-19 has changed the way we teach and learn including service-

learning (S-L). Purpose: This study examined how the work-from-home (WFH) mode

influenced work performance and learning outcomes of the student interns in an eight-week

S-L internship program, in which some of them worked from home while others worked on a

face-to-face (F2F) mode. Methodology/Approach: We adopted a qualitative research by

interviewing 13 students and four supervisors to opine their experience about how the work

modes shaped work performance and learning outcomes after completion of the internship.

Content analysis was used for data analysis. Findings/Conclusions: A total of 261 codes

encompassing the positive/negative impacts of the WFH mode and the critical factors for

WFH success were identified. Results showed that students did not prefer the WFH mode due

to ineffective communication and management practice, as well as less task variety and

learning opportunities, despite various merits of the WFH mode, such as easier time

management and conducive work environment. Implications: A theoretical model was

developed in purpose for enhancing the future success of WFH S-L internship, in which

communication practice and prior preparation play the key roles to WFH success.

Keywords: work-from-home, service-learning, internship program, work performance,

learning outcomes

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HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 3

Introduction

Service-learning (S-L) is a popular pedagogical approach in undergraduate programs

(Kolenko, Porter, Wheatley, & Colby, 1996). S-L internship programs have been developed

as a kind of summer course in several universities in Hong Kong. The syllabus of such

programs is designed to encourage students to apply academic theories to real-world

problems outside the classroom (Kolb, 1984; Sigmon, 1990) and offer direct services through

organizing activities to benefit service recipients in the community (Snell, Chan, & Ma,

2018). The current research studied an undergraduate S-L internship program called Service

Leadership Practicum. It comprised two components: service-learning and internship

components which had been conducted since 2013 on a face-to-face (F2F) mode. However,

in 2020, the course was conducted by an online mode and student interns (hereafter as interns)

were supposed to perform their duties on a work-from-home (WFH) instead of working in

the workplace of community partner organizations (CPOs) due to Covid-19. During the first

six weeks of the internship, since the pandemic was less severe, different work modes,

including F2F, WFH and mixed, were adopted by different CPOs. Some interns went to work

in their CPO’s workplace everyday, while some worked from home entirely and some

switched between the two work modes. It was the first time that the program had interns

serving the community from home, and hence whether the internship could be successfully

implemented by the WFH mode remained uncertain.

The WFH mode is one form of remote working arrangement that employees work in

their home environment and they do not need to travel to a central workplace (ILO, 2020).

Existing literature stated that there are many benefits (Alipour, Fadinger, & Schymik, 2020).

Covid-19 has induced online teaching and learning mode and has abruptly changed the

traditional way of teaching and learning that originally relies on the F2F mode, including S-L.

An imminent pedagogical issue for a WFH summer internship program is communication.

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HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 4

Past literature illustrated that online communication tends to be more suitable for existing

employees who have prior interpersonal relationship at the workplace before they work from

home (Choudhury, Larson, & Foroughi, 2019). Newly hired employees such as interns,

however, who have no/less ties to begin with may find themselves harder to engage and

perform at the workplace effectively on the WFH mode (Levin & Kurtberg, 2020). Research

found that people working from home not only suffer from a drastically reduced level of

interaction, but also have to interact with people remotely with an intention which is not as

natural as interacting face-to-face as in water cooler effects (Cowgill, Wolfers, & Zitzewitz,

2009). Without face-to-face engagement and casual meetings, people working from home

find that the ‘flow’ that makes things work becomes missing because the workplace serves as

a social environment rather than home (NASA, 2020). Furthermore, prior literature also

found that the nature of some jobs requires intensive interpersonal relationships which can

rule out the possibility of the WFH mode (Dingel & Neiman, 2020). One example is the

provision of direct service (Taylor, Bradley, & Warren, 1996). Therefore, there are many

challenges for interns to work from home in S-L internship programs.

Furthermore, unlike industrial internship programs, S-L internship programs are

predominantly developed pedagogically to allow interns to acquire learning experience by

forming realistic perceptions of social problems (Godfrey, 1999; Jacoby, 1996); dealing with

reality of practices (Abeysekera, 2006; Chang & Chu, 2009; Barr & Busler, 2011); and

facilitating interns to apply academic theories to solve problems in the real world (Titley,

1984), so that they can create social impacts to the community and service recipients

(Rehling, 2000). In order to do so, interns need to have first-hand experience in the

workplace by spending a larger amount of time there (Zheng, 2008; Loyola University New

Orleans, 2020). In sum, prior literature suggested that the WFH mode has more

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HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 5

communication problems than the F2F mode, and S-L interns are required to interact with

stakeholders in the workplace.

Extant literature also pointed out that a majority of WFH employees self-select the WFH

mode themselves before the pandemic (BeÂlanger, 1999) implying that people work from

home because they prefer to do so. However, it is not known if the respondents of the current

study prefer working from home and how the internship program has been affected by the

WFH mode. Therefore, the research team aims to investigate the following three research

questions for the analytical focus.

RQ1: Do the interns prefer the WFH or F2F mode?

Second, there is a lack of literature on S-L internship programs conducted on the WFH

mode, therefore the positive and negative impacts of WFH internship programs remain

unknown.

RQ2: What are the positive and negative impacts of the WFH mode on the interns’

work performance and learning outcomes?

Third, since the WFH mode in S-L internship programs is a relatively new phenomenon

(Wong, Lau, & Chan, 2020), it is high time to identify its WFH success factors in order to

steer the right way for the instructors, PORs and interns to work effectively under this new

workstyle.

RQ3: What are the success factors for interns working from home?

This research is to fill the knowledge gaps and contributes to emerging literature in the

WFH mode. This paper explores the interns’ preference on different work modes, the factors

driving positive work performance/learning outcomes, as well as identifies ways to support

and enhance students’ work experience in the internship program, leading to the success of

the implementation of S-L internship program. A WFH model for S-L internship program is

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HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 6

also developed to direct future development in terms of how CPOs and interns can work from

home effectively under the “new normal”.

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HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 7

Methods

Data Collection

A qualitative research method was adopted to contextually base on the sample’s lived

experience which was taken that the sample was an expert of his/her perception of that

experience (Alasuutari, 2010). Intensive post-internship interviews were conducted with both

PORs and interns to solicit corroborative evidence (Plutchik, 1983) from which different

perspectives on the same data helped reflect on the development of codes and categories

(Braun & Clark, 2013). The samples included four CPOs and 13 student interns, and their

profile is listed in Table 1 and Table 2.

------------------------------
Insert Table 1 about here
------------------------------
------------------------------
Insert Table 2 about here
------------------------------
All the four CPOs were either social enterprises or NGOs in Hong Kong in small to

medium scale. Each CPO received two to four interns. The interns consisted of five males

and eight females, from various academic disciplines and year of study, and their work

mode(s) employed during the internship are listed in Table 2.

Due to the social distancing measures enforced during Covid-19, an online audio-

conferencing software was employed to conduct the interviews. The POR interviews lasted

between 35 and 45 minutes, and the intern interviews lasted around 15 minutes. Prior to each

interview, ethical consent was sought and the interviews were conducted and recorded

anonymously. They were reassured about confidentiality and this paper uses pseudonyms to

maintain the confidentiality of the samples.

Interviews followed two interview protocols: POR and intern. The POR interview

protocol covered five aspects, namely 1) collaboration history with the university; 2)

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HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 8

evaluation of interns’ performance; 3) assessment of interns’ contribution to the CPO and the

community; 4) evaluation of the effectiveness of the WFH mode and its comparison with the

F2F mode; and 5) difficulties of working from home in the internship program and

suggestion of useful training and support to facilitate work performance in the WFH mode.

The intern interview protocol focused on four major areas, namely 1) self-evaluation of their

work performance; 2) difficulties encountered in the internship and ways to cope with such

difficulties; 3) comparison between the WFH and F2F mode, as well as keys to the success of

the WFH mode; and 4) suggestion of useful CPO’s supports for facilitating work

performance. In addition to the protocols, an open-ended question with probing questioning

strategy was also used to facilitate full, descriptive narratives from the samples (Miles,

Huberman, & Saldana, 2020).

Data Analysis

Content analysis was employed in data analysis, which “is a systematic, quantitative

approach to analyzing the content or meaning of communicative messages” (Maier, 2017,

p.243). This study applied a quantitative approach of content analysis which categorized data

into codes for the purpose of quantification of data (Neuendorf, 2019; Mohamed & Ragab,

2016; Vaismoradi, Turunen & Bondas, 2013). Student research assistants were employed to

transcribe the data from the audio recordings into written form. A guideline with criteria for

data transcription was established before the transcription to ensure its reliability and

consistency. The researchers familiarized themselves with the content of transcribed data,

which supported searching for meanings and patterns in the data set for developing a coding

scheme for data analysis. The coding scheme was established in which coding was based on a

reductive approach and the research team identified segments of data that shared a common

code (Coffey & Atkinson, 1996).

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HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 9

Afterwards, each transcript was coded based on the coding scheme. The research

team reviewed the codes to ensure the consistency of each code among different coders (Rose,

Spinks & Canhoto, 2015). The quantitative techniques including descriptive statistics such as

frequency counts were used to summarize and highlight the findings to answer the research

questions.

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HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 10

Results

The data analysis obtained a total of 261 codes, from which three separate categories

emerged: a) 149 codes were related to the impacts of the WFH mode, b) 43 codes were

related to the impacts of F2F mode, and c) 69 codes were related to the factors for the success

of the WFH mode.

Preferred Work Mode

The findings of both interns and PORs showed a preference for F2F over WFH mode.

Table 3 shows that a minority of 43 out of 149 codes indicated positive impacts of the WFH

mode, but a majority of 106 out of 149 codes indicated its negative impacts. In contrast, a

majority of 39 out of 43 codes indicated positive impacts of the F2F mode and four out of 43

codes indicated its negative impacts as shown in Table 4. The overwhelming number of

codes on both the negative impacts of the WFH mode and the positive impacts of the F2F

mode inferred that the latter was preferred over the former. The answers to RQ1 indicated

that a majority of the respondents did not prefer the WFH mode as compared to the F2F

mode.

------------------------------
Insert Table 3 about here
------------------------------
------------------------------
Insert Table 4 about here
------------------------------
Impacts of the WFH Mode

The data derived a total of 149 codes for the impacts of the WFH mode on the interns’

work performance: 43 codes were positive and 106 codes were negative which are

summarized in Table 3. Within the positive impacts of WFH, eight major subcategories were

identified which include good for learning, better task/time management, beneficial work

environment, saving commuting cost, saving supervision time, not coming in late, good for

10
HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 11

work motivation, and better work efficiency. Within the negative impacts of the WFH mode,

13 major subcategories were identified which include bad for communication/interaction,

difficulty to organize physical activities, undesirable work environment, hard to monitor,

hard to build relationships, less task variety, work problem cannot be solved immediately,

lower work efficiency, unclear work expectation/guideline, less workload, lower workload,

unclear work direction, and not motivated to work.

Impacts of F2F modes were also examined alongside with WFH modes. Table 4

comprises a total of 43 codes for the impacts of the F2F mode on the interns’ work

performance: 39 codes were positive and four codes were negative. The results from both

Table 3 and Table 4 are complementary to each other and can provide flip-side information

for verifying the consistency of the data. For example, when analyzing the positive impacts

of the WFH mode, one can cross-check the categories emerged from the negative impacts of

the F2F mode and vice versa.

Positive Impacts

Out of the 43 codes of positive impacts, 15 codes were identified as good for learning,

which topped the positive impacts. This result suggested that the WFH mode could foster

independent learning since the WFH interns had to rely on themselves rather than on their

supervisors when problems occured during working from home. As a result, this contributed

to the two PORs’ remarks that the WFH mode saved supervision time. This phenomenon was

echoed by a mention by a POR who worked on the F2F mode and found it time-consuming to

supervise interns by F2F mode as shown in Table 4.

The second top positive impact was better task/time management, in which 26 out of

43 codes emerged from the data. The interns working from home evinced that they could

manage their own time and task better as they needed to perform self-management. Six out of

43 codes revealed that home could offer beneficial work environment as a comfortable

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HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 12

workplace without much interference as in the office. This impact was also regarded as

having positive impacts on two other related positive impacts: better work efficiency and

good work motivation. Lastly, the WFH mode could also save interns’ commuting cost (six

codes) and risk of being late (one code). On the flip side, a similar category in the F2F mode:

commuting time to and from work was also echoed by one POR as a negative impact.

Negative Impacts

Disregarding the positive impacts of the WFH mode, a majority of 106 out of 149

codes were categorized as negative impacts. As demonstrated in Table 3, the WFH mode

posed the problem of bad communication and interaction between PORs and interns which

topped the negative impacts (29 out of 106 codes). It was substantiated by the top positive

impact emerged in the F2F mode (Table 4) in which 13 out of 39 codes indicated that F2F

mode facilitated communication and interaction.

Diminished communications and interaction between PORs and interns during

working from home had generated a chain of other problems as indicated in these five

categories (as shown in Table 3): hard to monitor, hard to build relationship, work problems

cannot be solved immediately, unclear work expectation/guideline, and unclear work

direction. Ten out of 106 codes were established in the difficulty for supervisors to monitor

the work progress and performance of the interns under the WFH mode which resulted in

insufficient supervision. A problem spun off from inadequate work supervision was unclear

work direction which consisted of three codes. On the other side, it was echoed by one code

in the positive impact that the F2F mode had made it easy for PORs to monitor interns’ work

performance.

Another problem arisen from insufficient communication and interaction was

hardship to build relationship between interns and supervisors/other stakeholders such as the

service recipients. On the flip side, 10 out of 39 codes echoed that the F2F mode had

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HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 13

facilitated relationship building. Since the S-L internship program under investigation was

pedagogically designed to serve the community mainly by direct services to the service

recipients through organizing physical activities (Snell et al., 2018), the WFH interns found it

difficult to organize physical activities while working from home (11 out of 106 codes)

which formed the second top negative impact of the WFH mode.

Since WFH mode had inhibited the interaction between interns and

supervisors/service recipients, therefore work problems could not be solved in time (six out

of 106 codes). As a result, other problems arise such as interns’ reduced work motivation

(three codes), hinderance in work quality (three codes) and efficiency (five codes).

In addition, eight codes were reported that WFH mode had induced lower task variety.

On the contrary, task variety (eight out of 39 codes) emerged as a positive impact in the F2F

mode. Lastly, undesirable environment also turned up with 10 codes implying that home

environment was not a desirable workplace when there were disturbances and insufficient

organizational IT/manpower supports.

In sum, the answers to RQ2 indicate that the positive impacts of WFH mode enhance

independent learning among interns, enable interns to manage themselves better in work and

use of time. However, the WFH mode affect negatively on interns’ work performance and

learning outcomes due to insufficient communication and interaction between the interns and

other stakeholders.

Success Factors for WFH

Table 5 depicts the success factors for the internship program adopting the WFH

mode. They include preparation for the WFH mode, personal motivators, job nature,

communication system, organizational support, prior WFH experience, and mutual trust and

empowerment.

------------------------------
Insert Table 5 about here

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HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 14

------------------------------
The success factors of the WFH internship was better preparation (18 out of 69 codes),

followed by personal motivators (17 out of 69 codes), job nature (11 out of 69 codes), and

communication system (nine out of 69 codes). The findings reflect that the PORs took a

management’s perspective, whereas the interns evaluated the success factors from an

employee's point of view.

WFH Preparation. In the current study, preparation was considered as a major factor

contributing to the success of the WFH S-L internship program. WFH preparation consists of

two major subcategories: a) active preparation (18 codes) and b) prior WFH experience (4

codes). Within active preparation, there are two subcategories: 1) formulating contingency

plan (four codes) and 2) agreement of work rules between supervisors and interns (10 codes).

Due to the changes in the severity of Covid-19, the supervisors’ active preparation for

switching work modes to cope with changing situations was considered as a vital success

factor which had in turn enhanced the interns’ work performance without causing

interruptions when the pandemic situation changed in the last two weeks of the internship.

Furthermore, a clear work rule and expectation set jointly by supervisors and interns had also

supported the interns to perform their work efficiently resulting in less requirement of

supervision. In addition, prior WFH experience could also enable the supervisors to monitor

their interns more effectively.

Personal Motivators. 17 codes emerged in this factor which has three subcategories:

a) self-discipline (seven codes), b) being proactive and taking initiatives (nine codes), c) and

keeping a sense of ownership of work (one code). The interns regarded self-discipline as one

of the major determinants for the WFH success, as self-discipline could turn one’s home into

an effective office. This factor reverberates on another factor: good for learning because the

WFH mode could create a situation for the self-disciplined interns to solve work problems

independently. This factor is also related to three other subcategories that the interns could

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HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 15

become more proactive, could take more initiatives to perform their tasks, and could keep a

sense of ownership of their tasks when they were disciplined.

Job nature. Eleven codes could be found in the factor. Most of the supervisors were

not prepared to execute the S-L internship program by the WFH mode since it was not

enforced by the Hong Kong government and therefore employers have no statutory rights to

do so (Randall, Wong, & Sethia, 2020). Furthermore, the program under study used to

involve interns in direct services before Covid-19 which required intense interpersonal

interactions between interns and service recipient due to the fact that F2F communication

with different stakeholders was inseparable in the direct service (Sigmon, 1990). In order to

prepare for the WFH mode, the supervisors could turn some of the jobs into independent

tasks which could be carried out at home without entailing intensive human interactions

which include video post-production, social media marketing, poster design, desktop research.

However, supervisors employing this measure should also consider the risk of reducing task

variety.

Communication. It was one of the major obstacles for the WFH mode. Nine codes

suggested that during working from home, more communication channels, such as regular

video-conferencing meetings, should be available for interns and supervisors to review work

progress. Furthermore, seven codes mentioned organizational supports including IT/technical

and manpower support and three codes on mutual trust and empowerment as success factors

for the WFH mode. When the interns felt trusted, they became more dedicated to their work

and more self-disciplined resulting in better work performance.

In sum, the answers to RQ3 about the success factors for the WFH mode is related to

WFH preparation, interns’ personal motivators, supervisors’ assignment of appropriate jobs,

and frequent communication between interns and supervisors.

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HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 16

Discussion

The findings show that the respondents did not prefer the WFH mode in the S-L

internship program because of less effective communication among different stakeholders,

resulting in lower work quality/efficiency, and less learning for interns compared to the F2F

mode. Furthermore, ineffective communication has also triggered a series of problems such

as work problems being stalled, work progress not being monitored in due time. In addition,

WFH mode does not suit the direct-service focussed S-L internship program. As a result, the

WFH mode has generated more negative impacts on interns’ performance and learning.

A WFH Model for S-L Internship Programs

In order to overcome the negative impacts of the WFH mode and ensure it to be

carried out effectively in future, a WFH model (in Figure 1) is developed based on the

findings of this study.

------------------------------
Insert Figure 1 about here
------------------------------
The WFH model is divided into two main phases, each of them include different

success factors. The first phase is the prerequisite phase before the WFH S-L internship

program commences and it is a vital stage paving for the success for the later implementation

phase. The prerequisite phase highlights several factors: a) active preparation, b) prior WFH

experience, and c) prior service-learning experience. Firstly, active preparation includes two

subcategories: a) contingency plan and 2) agreed work rules. CPOs can prepare contingency

plans before the internship starts to deal with any potential issues that may occur during the

internship. Furthermore, agreed work rules between interns and supervisors should be

formulated so as to clarify expectations which can also compensate the communication

insufficiency induced by the WFH mode.

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HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 17

Secondly, PORs with prior WFH experience are able to deliver better WFH internship

programs than those without because PORs can use their experience to buffer the negative

WFH impacts in communication, task assignment, review/feedback system, etc.

Thirdly, those CPOs with prior service-learning experience is believed to be more

able to integrate service-learning in the WFH internship program when assigning tasks

suitable for the WFH interns, without compromising task and experience variety.

The second implementation phase emphasizes on three job-related factors: a)

effective communication system, b) suitable job nature and c) conducive work environment.

First, PORs set up effective communication systems which monitor interns’ work

performance and provide timely advice for interns to solve work problems. Second, PORs

assign interns with appropriate jobs for the WFH mode, such as tasks that can be performed

independently with a suitable combination of task variety and workload. Supervisors select a

variety of tasks from other components of S-L services such as indirect services, advocacy

and research when direct service has become not possible (University of Minnesota, 2011).

Third, to transform home environments into conducive work environments, supervisors

should take into consideration of interns’ ability of self-discipline and the presence of any

disturbance, such as noise and distractions (e.g. caring duties) at home before adopting the

WFH mode.

In addition to the two phases, the model also includes two human factors: a) personal

motivators and b) relationship between interns and supervisors, which moderate the success

of the WFH mode during the two phases. The personal motivators consist of the interns’ self

discipline, and their ability to concentrate at work and resist distractions at home. The second

human factor is the relationship between interns and supervisors, such as having mutual trust

and empowerment.

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HOW STUDENTS WORK FROM HOME 18

The factors in the model are interrelated and in effect affecting each other in the two

phases on work performance and internship experience. For example, mutual trust between

interns and supervisors is likely the product of good communication system. Intern’s self-

discipline is somehow a moderator to the influence of work (home) environment. Whether

interns are devoted to work is also affected by whether tasks assigned to them are compatible

to the WFH setting. More importantly, prior WFH and service-learning experiences of the

CPOs would have direct impacts on their ability to implement the S-L internship program

smoothly under the WFH mode. Another factor is the WFH preparation made by CPOs such

as establishing effective communication system with interns, it in turn can provide timely

support to solve work problems. Moreover, a well prepared contingency plan can also help

improve interns’ work efficiency/quality during the implementation phase, particularly when

switching between work modes. These proposed interaction effects can be further

investigated in future studies. The contribution of this model is that it offers an overview of

the WFH mode in S-L internship program and ways for further improvement. Besides, it also

supplements a few of prior literature on the WFH mode in industrial internship (for example,

Maurer, 2020).

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Conclusion

Covid-19 has triggered the S-L internship program to adopt WFH mode and has

caused certain pedagogical problems. Although this research was based on limited data with

preliminary analysis, results have discovered major issues of the WFH mode and its key

success factors which are explained by a systematic two-phase model. Given that working

from home has become a “new normal” and is not expected to be relinquished even after

Covid-19, this study serves as a guidepost for the instructors, CPOs and interns to make

future S-L internship program successful by the WFH mode. Moreover, the results of this

study can offer insights as to how to implement WFH S-L internship programs to serve the

CPOs and the community and offer better interns’ learning experience in future.

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Table 1

Profile of the CPOs and their PORs in the Internship Program

CPO’s Interviewees’ (PORs’) Profile The Students

Label CPO Type Service Nature Position Gender Assigned (in no.)
A NGO Environmental Protection Project Director Male 1, 2
B NGO Relieving Poverty Project Manager Male 3,4,5,6
C Social Enterprise Start-ups & Entrepreneurship Co-founder & Chief Development Officer, 2 males 7,8,9
Impact Catalyst
D University Service-Learning Programme Manager Male 10,11,12,13

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Table 2

Profile of the Student Interns in the Internship Program

Year of Assigned Work Mode in

Label Gender Faculty Study CPO the first six weeks*
01 F Arts 2 A WFH
02 F Social Sciences 2 A WFH
03 F Social Sciences 2 B F2F
04 F Social Sciences 2 B F2F
05 M Social Sciences 3 B F2F
06 M Social Sciences 3 B F2F
07 F Social Sciences 3 C WFH
08 M Arts 4 C WFH
09 M Business 4 C F2F
10 F Arts 3 D 1 day WFH, 4 days F2F
11 F Social Sciences 3 D 1 day WFH, 4 days F2F
12 F Social Sciences 1 D 1 day WFH, 4 days F2F
13 M Business 3 D 1 day WFH, 4 days F2F

Note. * All interns work from home in the last two weeks of the internship program due to

the third wave of Covid-19.

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Table 3

The Positive and Negative Impacts of WFH Mode on Interns' Work Performance by Respondent Type

No. of Codes No. of Codes

Positive Impact POR Intern Total Negative Impact POR Intern Total
Good for learning 4 11 15 Bad for communication/ interaction 9 20 29
Better task/ time management 3 8 11 Difficult to organize activities and campaigns 3 8 11
Beneficial work environment 1 5 6 Distractions at home 2 8 10
Save commuting cost 0 6 6 Hard to monitor 4 6 10
Save supervision time 2 0 2 Hard to build relationships 5 4 9
Not coming in late 1 0 1 Less task variety 4 4 8
Good for work motivation 0 1 1 Work problem cannot be solved immediately 1 5 6
Better work efficiency 1 0 1 Lower work efficiency 1 4 5
Unclear work expectation/ guideline 1 4 5
Less workload 0 4 4
Lower work quality 0 3 3
Unclear work direction 1 2 3
Not motivated to work 2 1 3
Total 12 31 43 Total 33 73 106

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Table 4

The Positive and Negative Impacts of F2F Mode to Interns' Work Performance by Respondent Type

No. of Codes No. of Codes

Positive Impact POR Intern Total Negative Impact POR Intern Total
Good for communication/ interaction 5 8 13 Consume too much supervisor's time 1 0 1
Good for building relationships 5 5 10 Travel time to and from work 1 0 1
Better task variety 5 3 8 Bad for communication/ interaction 0 1 1
Good for learning organizational cultures 4 1 5 Conflict between interns and colleagues 0 1 1
Easy to monitor 1 0 1
Easy for intern to get familiar with work 1 0 1
Better work efficiency 1 0 1
Total 22 17 39 Total 2 2 4

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Table 5

The Key Drivers for WFH Success by Respondent Type

No. of Codes
Key driver POR Intern Total
Better preparation for WFH 10 8 18
Personal motivator in WFH 3 14 17
Job nature for WFH 2 9 11
Communication system 5 4 9
Organizational support 2 5 7
Prior WFH experience 2 2 4
Mutual trust and empowerment 1 2 3
Total 25 44 69

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Figure 1

The WFH Model for Service-Learning Internship Program

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