Keep track of the amount of time that interns and temporary employees will be at a company with an “employment countdown clock” on each employee badge.

Background:

Many companies issue ID badges to their employees.

Sometimes these come in multiple forms: one type of badge for permanent workers, and a different color for temporary employees.

Proposal:

In order make the time-limited nature of temporary employees more clear—and perhaps to remind the temporary employee to start applying for jobs again—a low-power timer could be integrated into the badge (see Figure 1).

1-badge-expiration — ***Fig. 1:*** These two styles of time-limited contractor badges make it easy to tell how long a temporary employee will remain at the company. On the right, the e-ink “progress bar” style gives an obvious visual indication of remaining time.

Conclusion:

This approach was illustrated in the 1976 film Logan’s Run, where a crystal in each citizen’s hand would change color when a citizen was about to “expire.”

If you run a a Silicon Valley-based startup, you should definitely integrate a timer into future employee badges.

PROS: Allows employees to avoid starting long-term projects with just-about-to-leave temporary employees.

CONS: E-ink displays are surprisingly expensive in low volumes, so these high-tech badges may cost slightly more. One cheaper approach would be a circular “countdown clock” wheel in each badge that employees would manually update on a weekly basis.