Analyst Review

The work has been excellent in a way that it is challenging and pushes you but also have a great support network around you to help you learn and point you in the right direction. In summary the work changes constantly which is nice and also helps you gain a lot of breadth in your skills.

My individual team were excellent, we went on multiple social events after work which helped develop excellent working realitionships during the day. Outside of my team, colleagues in my department were confused when I said I was leaving as they didn't know I was an intern. Which goes to show you do genuinely get treated like an employee and colleagues are more than happy to support you.

My line manager was excellent, he gave me full flexibility over my own workload but also gave me extra opportunities during the internship for me to add value to the company and help develop me personally. Your managers are usually very senior which may sound daunting but it is an excellent opportunity to network and my manager was very approachable and always set aside time when I needed it.

I was busy at work, however this was because I sought out extra work myself because I was enjoying what I did and liked having more to do. You really can manage your own workload, some days I would stop till gone 7pm but other days I would leave at 1pm. I also had the ability to work from home which was very useful.

The responisbility varied, some tasks were not pushed for time and were only required in order to tick boxes etc. Whilst other work I was given was to deliver the departments first report to a group of senior stakeholders which came with a lot of responsibility. Other tasks also came with a high degree of responsibility but you are always given the support you need in order to deliver them if you are willing to put the work in.

I have developed some hard skills such as Excel, SQl and Python however my main areas of development were in my soft skills. I have much more confidence in working within a professional environment. My degree is quite specific and not fully related to the internship so it would be unfair to criticise on this. I do feel like I am now more motivated for 3rd year having a career path in my head.

My office is very quiet which does stop it being manic like you would expect some corporate environments to be. It has a very relaxed atmosphere and people are normally quite upbeat and optimistic. I was fortunate that my team tended to be reasonably socialable outside of work so the atmosphere in work was helped and it was good to have good working relationships in this way.

The company invested heavily into training and development. There was an excel workshop run towards the beginning of the placement which was very useful and later into the placement there was a team building development day which was a great way to team build and get to know your colleagues better. The final formal session you are given is a presentation course which shows you how to use your body language effectively and use your voice in a way that people will listen.

The placement is all geared around trying to offer you a job for after university. They genuinely use the internship as a way to develop talent early and that comes across as an intern. We are still yet to find out who will receive offers but there is definitely excellent career prospects by the company and the graduate team work hard to ensure the internship gives you opportunities to demonstrate why you should be offered the graduate scheme.

You are placed in accomodation with your fellow placement student so this lends itself to a very socialable lifestyle outside of work. We went of days out on the weekends and went for drinks on the nights sometimes for an hour or two. But mainly the social events were low key like watching films etc and just sitting and chatting. The accomodation is very nice and its is great to be placed amongst other interns.

The price of accomodation was £0 as Centrica provide it. South students are based in royal holloway and the accomodation there is really good and well located for travel to the offices. The average food shop in the area is slightly more expensive than living up north but that was expected. Generally speaking the cost of socialising and living is relatively standard, you can make it as expensive or as cheap as you want. There is a wetherspoons in Windosr which is a must however !