Labour market changes over the last year present both challenges and opportunities for universities and employers adapting their work experience offerings for the new season, explains Laura Carter, employer engagement lead at The Open University.
ISE’s Student Development Survey found 87% of employers are expecting AI to reshape graduate and apprentice roles.
GenAI has also changed recruitment. Employers report being swamped with growing volumes of AI-generated applications that lack authenticity, personality and clear evidence of the qualities they’re looking for. ISE also found 48% of employers are concerned that graduates’ use of AI is misrepresenting their abilities.
So how can employers access genuine graduate talent with the potential they need for future growth? It starts with a fresh re-think about work experience offerings for the 2026/2027 academic year and beyond. Our practical advice for employers:
1. Diversify work experience offer
Across the HE sector, students are juggling competing pressures and are often time-poor and financially constrained, making conventional internships less feasible. Consider supplementing these with more flexible options that can broaden access to talent and increase engagement.
At the OU we’ve been working with employers to develop a range of flexible work-based learning options to give all students an opportunity to gain experience. These include:
- Virtual internships with flexible hours
- Micro-internships
- Employer-led experiential learning events and hackathons
- E-mentoring and work shadowing
- Informational interviews and sector insight events
2. Focus on skills demonstration, not just application quality
In an AI-enabled world, how candidates demonstrate their skills becomes more important than how they describe them. Embedding assessment within real or simulated work contexts can provide richer insights into graduate talent. Recent examples from employers working with the OU:
- In the IBM Design Challenge, 85 students across various study disciplines worked in teams to develop AI-driven solutions linked to the UN Sustainable Development Goals, generating ideas ranging from sustainable retail tools to smart community systems. “The students were extremely engaged and brought a wealth of experience to the activity, which is uncommon,” said John McNamara, IBM.
- With Thames Valley Police, students applied their legal and social science knowledge to real-world issues, developing proposals on topics such as e-scooters and public safety. PC Adrian Café from Thames Valley Police worked with teams of six social sciences and law students, commenting: “Really impressed with the work produced. It has certainly given us what we wanted from this project."
- Through Kainos’ Code Connect event, students gained insight into agile software delivery while building confidence in their technical and collaborative skills.
3. Co-design work experience opportunities with universities
Co-designed programmes enable employers to shape student experiences while gaining early access to talent. They also ensure that opportunities align with evolving curriculum and student needs across the UK.
“Work-based experiential learning builds student confidence and skills, helping them achieve their goals. It also helps the OU empower communities through partnership with employers,” said Georgina Hawkins, OU Employer Engagement Manager.
4. Recognise non-linear talent pathways
Another important shift is the changing profile of the UK student population, increasingly building work experience, transferable skills and professional behaviours alongside a degree rather than afterwards.
‘Earners and learners’ start to build self-management skills early, becoming accustomed to balancing responsibilities, and are comfortable working autonomously. Students bring varied experiences, including part-time work, caring or career changes. Authentic work experience can provide a powerful signal of:
- Practical skills and applied knowledge.
- Collaboration and communication.
- Initiative and problem-solving.
- Professional behaviours and resilience.
This can often evolve directly into employment, providing an alternative recruitment channel to the traditional, resource-heavy routes.
At property expert platform HiiGuru two out of four recent OU intern hires have continued working with the organisation beyond their placements. Dara Chen, CEO at HiiGuru, says: “always impressed with the quality of the OU interns… they come with very diverse personal and professional experiences that bring real depth and value to the business.”
5. Invest in scalable, high-impact engagement
Group-based programmes allow employers to engage larger numbers of students efficiently while still delivering meaningful outcomes. Another powerful student benefit is the opportunity to connect and collaborate meaningfully with other students. This is increasingly important as distance learning options gain popularity.
ISE employer research suggests that applicants’ interpersonal capabilities are less developed, and these experiences provide a forum for students to develop and evidence these skills.
Micro-internships are our newest example of this. Groups of 10-15 students collaborate on a specific employer project for a total of five days’ work experience, spread across up to five weeks. OU Placements Manager Mary Older says “Micro-Internships not only build skills and experience but also give students valuable and inspiring insights into your sector or organisation.”
Impressed with the outputs, Sean Doyle, Head of Education at Classroom 42 said “Through this innovative micro-internship, we had the opportunity to plan and deliver a programme that gave us a sprint-start on content creation - providing significantly more output than we would ordinarily have gained in a short space of time.” One student participant described it as a “fantastic bite-size opportunity to test my skills in a professional context.”
Looking ahead
The changes to the world of work that GenAI is bringing create an opportunity to rethink both how we prepare students for the workplace and how employers identify and develop graduate talent.
Flexible, authentic work-based learning can play a critical role in bridging this gap. By giving students the opportunity to apply their skills in real-world contexts, we not only build their confidence and commercial awareness, but also provide employers with an opportunity to identify potential talent for their organisations.
In an era of AI-generated applications, authenticity matters more than ever. Flexible work experience opportunities, reimagined for a changing world, may be one of the most effective ways to find it.