Technology Spring Intern Review

I very much enjoyed my time here at Barclays - i met some very nice people during my Spring week and made some good friends. The programme included a variety of things including talks with Managing Directors of aa number of divisions within Banking in Technology, networking sessions, work shadowing amongst other things which really made the Spring Week worthwhile

I felt valued in the sense that we were treated really well and we were made aware of how well we done to get onto the Spring Week because of the competition that was included. Our travel to and from the Spring Week was expensed and Barclays even gave us canteen cards to use. We had talks with many senior members of Barclays and it was nice to see them take interest in the interns.

We received a good amount of guidance and support. The internship was very well organised by the HR team who done an extremely good job in making sure that we were up to date with everything and that the week ran smoothly. We received a really good insight into Barclays - starting with their value RISES (which will soon be stuck in your head) and also got a good insight into all the different divisions within Banking with a focus on technology.

We were given a group presentation to do which included a technical and strategic problem that we had to solve. It was an interesting project which required good teamwork, analysis and listening skills which are valuable in future career. In general, I received advice that I will most likely carry with me for the rest of my life, given wise insights into various areas of interests.

The insight was very well structured. There was always something on the agenda and there wasn't a time where we were sat around doing nothing. One thing i would say however is that there were some presentations that I saw no value in, for instance the Networking presentation which explained how to Network. I thought it was quite common sense however having said that i do understand the importance of it and perhaps someone who has never networked before may find it useful.

The atmosphere was very pleasant. The HR team were always happy to help us and the fellow interns were good fun too. When we went to visit the Barclaycard floor i got a general good vibe due to the agile working environment Barclays have tried to emerge into. Everybody seems friendly and there seems to be quite a young intake of graduates, which is promising.

The company certainly invested a week worth of experience and many senior people gave up their time to speak to us and give us a valuable insight into Barlcays. However, not much technical development was provided. Perhaps a session in coding or a tutorial of the computer language used widely within Barclays would have been beneficial. Nevertheless, I felt like Barclays did try their best to develop us.

I had the opportunity to speak to many graduates at Barclays and I met some very genuine people who were honest about their experiences at Barclays. I did also get the impressions that some graduates didn't particularly enjoy their work but there were some who thoroughly loved their role. I feel its highly depended on what division you're put in. I also had the opportunity to shadow some analysts and got a good impression of what sort of activities and roles are included within Barclays.

The insight made me understand the culture of Barclays very well. In fact, I don't think i will forget the company values which i mentioned earlier. The values are heavily depicted within the building and we had a whole session dedicated to understand the values and what they mean with Directors and VP's giving us a brief.

It helps you decide whether you want a career within Technology in banking. It doesn't really give an understand of whether you should go into banking in general with regards to the Front Office or PCB side of things but there are other Spring Weeks for that. Overall, its reassuring to see many people who are not form a tech background (like myself) working within technology at Barclays.

I was paid £250 for the week

Yes

They were okay - to be honest i felt it was quite forced and to some extent i didn't really see the value of it. We were grouped together with the interns from other divisions so it was nice to meet them however overall i felt it lacked the natural flow. There was a rush to find someone to network with as there were over 100 interns and not many senior members in Barclays.

Not really, one of the interns asked a graduate in a Q&A session whether anything was on offer and they were positive that there was a lot of activities to pursue outside of work. However, I wasn't too convinced as some graduates I spoke too worked very late each day so seemed unlikely they had time to participate in any activities. Overall, it most likely depends on your role, age and time.

Yes - its certainly worth it due to the experience