Finance Intern Review

I have found the internship to be a great insight into the company, and feel that I have improved my technical skills in finance. As I have been based in a project role, the day to day work had been better than I expected. I was anticipated a summer working in finance to be a lot of manual data, but this interhship has offered much more than that. The people who I've worked with have all been really helpful, and the access to senior management has always been there. It took a while to get used to the sysystem however which made the start quite frustrating. I do feel like I could have kicked on more in the last few weeks, but due to the nature of finance (predominantly monthly tasks) if I was to learn more in the last month, I'd never have the opportunity to implement it.

Very, I have always felt that the work I do is relevant and important to suppourting those around me. My direct managers have always been approachable, and even the FD has taken time out to chat with me about the internship / my development. The office that I work in is very big, but even some people from other departments began approaching me with queries when my managers were absent. As mentioned above I feel that I would have had more of an interesting alst few weeks had my time with the company been longer.

I started the internship with little knowledge of finance within a company, and only basic excel skills. My managers invested a lot of time in my development which I was really greatful for. I was given all the information I think I'd have been given if I were to stay longer with the company. It would have been better if I'd have reported to more people as a lot of the work was just ad-hoc, and if I'd have been given more mini projects I'd have enjoyed it much more. My managers were also very busy, so that delayed things, thankfully in this case it was quality over quantity.

This differed depending on the weeks, month end was really busy and often I stayed late to help out. During the 12 weeks I tried to keep myself as busy as I could, there is no point going to work and not pushing yourself. The least busy days were when my manager was not in the office, but I tried to find as much work as I could, I'd just ask for more from other people. It would have been a lot better if I was given more projects myself, but knowing the size of the project I worked on, I understand that they can't trust an intern to do certain things.

As most of my work was ad-hoc / reporting to managers the level of responsibility has not been too high. But again this is understandable given the duration of the internship and the time it took to become fully competent in the tasks I was assigned. The good thing is that I feel that I left at a stage where I was comfortable with everyting I was doing / asked of me, so I know that if it lasted longer I'd have been trusted to "kick on".

I feel that I will go back to uni more prepared for my finance modules. Some of what I've learnt already has been relevant to the work I've been doing, but as with most jobs I don't think what you learn theoretically is directly transferable to your job role. But the people skills and expereince gained has been good, I feel that I'll go into my next role more prepared and able to make more of an instant impact.

It was a really large office so the atmosphere wasn't great, I'd have preferred walking into a smaller office so I could get to know everyone, but this is just the nature of project based work I suppose. The people around me were nice, but I had little contact with the majority of people in the office so didn't really get to know as many people as I'd have liked. The average age was 40's / 50's so a lack of youthful presence was disapointing.

I feel that they were prepared for me, but it did take a while to get all my access sorted (printing / software etc). I was given monthly tasks which were all well structured but in-between that it was just ad-hoc so running reports etc. I was the only intern on site so a lack of proper structure is understandable compared to one of the big 4 for example. My manager did try and keep me busy at all times.

As it was only a short internship, the level of training given was not that high. But my manager always took time out to help me with things, he has basically taught me to be a bit of an excel whiz, and I was able to attend other departments training events which I really enojyed. If I were to stay longer I know the company would have invested more in me.

The grad scheme here looks really good, and I have had good reviews so it will be one of the comapnies I apply to and I'll just see how it all goes. The scheme itself looks interesting but it will all depend on the placements that you are given, if they were to be anything like this one I'd enjoy to continue with the company.

The social scene was poor. The average age was 40 - 50 so there weren't too many people to see outside of work. I did go for a few meals out with work which was nice, but the closest age to myself was one person in their late 20's. Luckily I was able to meet loads of other interns out of work, so the summer has been really enjoyable out of work.

Edinburgh is pretty expensive compared to the surrounding areas, but nothing extortionate. I could have lived closer to work but I wanted to stay somewhere where things are going on all the time, and it's been worth the commute. Nights out were not too bad either so long as you know where you are going, but the West End is a litle pricey.

Very good, I went out with the other interns I lived with and they were always good nights. A lot of choices of places to go and most were enojyable. This is in Edniburgh though, if I were to live closer to work and not an hours commute away the nightlife would be non-existent.

The nature of where I work meant that access to these sort of activities was extremely limited, but I'm told it's a quite different in other locations. I would have liked to get involved with sports teams but it's somrthing which I think would be possible at other sites. The age range meant that most people see the job as a 9-5 and not much else, a larger amount of younger workers would have helped.