Assistant Risk Manager (Lloyds Scholar Intern) Review

I enjoyed it to a point and think I learnt a lot about risk but there were times during which I felt unsupported.

I felt like part of the team and received good feedback from colleagues outside of the team when they dealt with me.

I would have preferred for issues to have been brought up as and when they happened rather than weeks after the fact when I have a limited amount of time to fix it.

For the first two weeks, my laptop/email/pass had not been sorted out and that meant that by the time it all eventually came I had only been reading training guides for over a fortnight. I am now extremely busy with 3 pieces of work due before the end of the internship. I feel if it had all been sorted out before I arrived, I would have had a much better balance.

I was given one piece of work that I was allowed to run on (data validation) I really enjoyed the piece - especially giving feedback to 1st line and got really good feedback. But other than that most of my work was not integral to the team, it was more of an added value type of thing.

I think that working in a corporate environment and having a line manager is good experience for when you go into that world. It's totally different to having a boss in a service job. I wouldn't say the intern training sessions were brilliant. A lot of it is just repeating stuff you already know. Discover learning was helpful when it came down to risk management lessons.

Most of my team are either working from home for some of the week or don't work in my office. This was difficult - especially when I was in on my own.

I did not get my laptop/email/pass/phone for over two weeks because it had not been ordered before I arrived. My line manager also went on holiday for two weeks right off the bat so I was basically reading for over two weeks. This was extremely annoying because there's only so much time you can spend just reading without doing anything of substance. After that I got the feeling the work hadn't been decided beforehand. I just picked up things along the way. The rest of the internship felt better, obviously, because I could shadow calls and do actual work, ect. Also I had the added stress of having to wait 10 weeks for my rent cheque which was ridiculous and should've been made clearer to those deciding to stay in their own flats.

I feel invested in as a Lloyds Scholar. There's no doubt it is a great opportunity for training and financial support.

I'm still not sure yet. I think that this internship made me really think about what I want to end up doing with my life. Unfortunately it wasn't Risk but I am hopeful that during my next internship I will find something that clicks. Lloyds has a good flexible working policy which I like (although wasn't allowed to partake in during the internship).

There was lots of stuff going on whether organised by the interns themselves or events relating to the charity challenge.

Edinburgh isn't cheap so that's something to keep in mind. Even more so because the Fringe was on. But if you're able to look in the right places you can find something. The cost of living is cheaper than London but more expensive than Manchester.

Edinburgh during the Fringe is amazing. Nothing else to say.

I volunteered while working. There's time if you can find something you want to do and are not too tired to do it.