Project Assistant Review

The 10-week placement was really meaningful and I enjoyed it very much. Overall there was a pleasant working environment, nice working-life balance, very cooperative colleagues and good facilities in office. I feel it really worthwhile to spend my summer here learning from Lloyds and developing myself through ‘putting customer together’, ‘keep it simple’ and ‘make a difference together’.

My work was truly valued by my colleagues. They will be very happy to give out some exciting and responsible work for me to do. They also fully respect your input and I am feeling that I am making real difference to the team, which is really nice feeling and would a fantastic motivation for me to contribute more.

At the beginning of the internship, I had a 121 talk with my line manager every week, later then I had mid-term review and final review respectively at 5th and 8th week. My manager is very helpful and always cares for what I have learned and whether I need more help. I also had a buddy who is currently in her graduate scheme in Lloyds, she is kind and always reaches out to help, I have arranged call with her every other week to talk about current progress and she will give her suggestions on how I can make most of the placement.

It depends. During the first several weeks my work were generally based on discover& learning, supporting activities and shadowing others. Later then I was given some full responsibility work and become bit busier. Although there is some time I don’t have much to do, I can ask my colleagues around and they are very happy to give me some tasks to work with.

I was given some fully responsibility tasks such as managing the SharePoint and action updates at Change Management Toolkit, which are very exciting jobs for an intern to take some full ownership and develop your all-around skills. We also have a Responsible Business Challenge in which we are responsible to raise money for BBC Children in Need, a good way to raise community awareness, build self-confidence and leadership skills in events management and engagement.

There was mandatory training and induction day at the start of the meeting. During work I have also completed colleague identity training which covers judgement, drive, execution and influence. During the placement I feel I have developed my communication skills (how to tailor your communication to different people), problem-solving skills and design skills. I have also learned change management which will to a large extent assist in my degree studies of business management.

I am in Group Operations. People here in office are really nice, they bring food to share, ask for coffee round and are very willing to help any time. But I do think the atmosphere in Finance division in floor 1 is more vivid, partly because they have less meetings and always stay at their desks, also partly because they are sitting much more closer to each other compared with phase 2.

Well organised. There was an induction day at the beginning in which we got a chance to meet every interns and scholars. During the placement, we have been contacted by Emerging Talent every week for webinars, current progress, etc. In addition, my colleague has helped to book my laptop, my file ID, mile account, token (remote key) and any needed facilities before I come. Overall it is a very sophisticated system of placement.

Lloyds really care about personal development. At induction day I had a chance to meet very top level people in Lloyds; during the first 4 weeks I had webinars on various helpful topics including ‘personal impact’, ‘customer excellence’, ‘delivering together’ and ‘adding value’. Also my mid-term and final review will also give me a clear way of where are my development areas.

Very appealing. I have known some information of the graduate scheme from my buddy, webinars and from my manager. The graduate scheme within 2 years will allow graduates to experience different business units in different places across the country, and graduates will be given different tasks on either leading the group or support the group to deliver excellent outputs. I feel it really an appealing chance to challenge oneself and go beyond oneself after graduation. And definitely nice career prospect in Lloyds after that.

Yes there are. All students (who were relocated) were provided accommodation from Lloyds so we live in the same building. It is bit like colleague residence therefore there are plenty of times you social with your fellow intern/scholars. We always walk to and back from work together, much appreciate this relationship with other interns. We were so lucky to come across 2016 UEFA and Rio Olympics during the 10 week time, we gather in someone’s room, watching matches and have fun.

I live in Bristol, a city with not too expensive or cheap price. Socializing facilities are plenty, cinemas, shopping centres and even Cabot Circus, which is really famous. There are also some restaurants I would recommend, e.g. beefeaters, sky divers, etc.

Nightlife are rich, people going out a lot on Friday days, you will never be bored in Bristol.

Definitely. In July and August, there are two big festivals in Bristol you will definitely enjoy. One is Habourside Festival – just at the back of Lloyds office and Balloon Festival – people all over the UK will come and see colourful balloons. They also have food, music, international performances, etc. really worth to go and there are fireworks at night!