Summer Analyst Review

I really enjoyed my internship! The team was incredibly welcoming, and senior managers got personally engaged in my experience with the firm. I felt as thought I became part of the team on the very first day, and was quickly given trust and responsibility. I was never "clock-watching" but rather always busy with genuinely interesting, interactive and insightful tasks.

I felt highly valued by my colleagues. Despite my internship being fairly short (4 weeks) they put in the time and effort to: explain ongoing projects in detail, patiently go through the fundamentals of technical aspects, and get to know me personally. As a result of this, I was able to develop my professional skills and gain confidence, while taking on an increasing amount of tasks from a wide variety of people.

As mentioned in the above comment, I was given a lot of support from management/my supervisor. On the first day, they made it clear that it is important for me to be proactive, and approach people for tasks if I am not busy with anything specific. Every time I did this, people were very willing to put the time aside to include me in their project, explain the basics, and get me going on an insightful task.

I was quite busy, but this was an active choice. Every time I finished a task, I asked if I could help with anything else. If I had no asked for tasks, I would have been significantly less busy as the team was always busy, and would not have noticed if I had just been sat at my computer doing nothing. It was therefore very up to the intern to make something out of their internship, or just sit there and count down the minutes.

I was given a sufficient amount of responsibility. I was not overwhelmed with responsibility, but I was also not given tasks that had no significance to the team (that would not have been stimulating.) I was also not given 'boring' inputting tasks, but rather a great variety of tasks that tended to be very market research-oriented. The great thing with receiving such a huge variety of tasks meant that I got a very thorough idea of what the team does on a daily basis.

The specific skills may not be overly helpful, however, the overall understanding of the industry that the internship has given me will be immensely useful. I have a much better idea of what the team does on a daily basis, and this has given me a better understanding of whether it is an area that I want to pursue a career in, or not. It has also been important for me to get a feel of what the culture in the firm is like, and how this differs from the culture in other firms or industries.

The atmosphere is great! People are very welcoming and enthusiastic. Everyone comes up to say hi to you, and welcome you to the firm. There is a great work-life balance, and a great mix of social- and sports events. Because the firm has such a wide array of teams doing such different tasks, it also means that there is a very great diversity of people in the office, and this really contributes to a wonderful work atmosphere.

The internship was set up very well. We had a great introduction day, and presentations/events organized through-out the internship. There were good opportunities for all of the interns to get to know one another, and at the end of the four weeks, many of us were close. The only improvement I could potentially suggest, is having slightly more social events to facilitate even greater bonding between interns. But overall, this was a really well organized internship and I genuinely had a fantastic time! I highly recommend it.

The company invested in my personal training quite a lot. As mentioned, very many senior managers sat down with me at least twice (for 30 min) just to get to know me on a personal level, understand my ambitions and interests, and offer any advice/answer any questions. It was really insightful and interesting to hear about their career paths and general advice on life. Although there was not a huge amount of technical training, I felt that this sort of engagement in my development was much more valuable and encouraging.

Future employment prospects are extremely appealing! I really enjoyed my internship, and look forward to working more with the team in the future. I also really enjoyed the great work-balance attitude, and the general atmosphere in the office. People seemed to be happy about going to work in the morning, and everyone stopped by each other's desks to chat/joke. It was an incredibly friendly, welcoming and supportive environment.

There was a good social scene, although the internship program could perhaps have organized a few more social events. Overall though, they gave us a very good initial platform. On the first day, we had a full day of team building activities and bonding over dinner/mini-golf. This was invaluable, as it allowed us to build onto these relationships our selves through-out the internship by for example going for lunch together.

London is quite expensive, as was the area we worked in.

I didn't have much time to go out during my internship.

Yes, this very much comes down to who you are as a person and whether you actively seek out fun things to do or prefer to stay home and relax.