Marketing intern Review

The placement has been amazing - everyone is so friendly and supportive, my manager tailored my work projects to meet my interests/strengths and everyone else was more than happy to talk me through their jobs, let me help out and ask for advice etcetera. The intern workshops for personal development - CV and interview skills, public-speaking were obviously not run by seasoned training professionals but they covered a lot of basic, helpful points and were an invaluable addition offered by CRUK. The intern fundraising team was a lot of fun too!

I was thanked and praised for all of my work at Cancer Research UK - for the most part, I felt like the tasks I was given were really important rather than just generic tasks to keep me busy. Everyone else was really friendly and welcoming, so I felt like I settled into the team really really quickly.

Our weekly 121s were very helpful and managed well, we talked through all my work projects, personal development objectives and anything else that might be on my mind - personal stuff too, how I was getting on/finding the team in general. My supervisor had never managed anyone before but she was really supportive, explained all of my work clearly and then let me get on with it which is exactly what I like, she was more than happy to give extra feedback/support if I asked. She also helped hugely with my job search for after the internship, going above and beyond to help.

My main projects were busy and enjoyable, but I definitely could have managed at least one more project - I was at a bit of a loose end some days if my manager was busy with things I couldn't help out on. One of my projects was quite mundane admin, so I tried to break it up with some of the more enjoyable stuff, but by the end of the internship it was all I had left to do. My days were full but not manic, I definitely would have liked to take on one more project.

For my main project I was completely responsible for the first drafts, and then it was taken off my hands to be checked/amended. The rest of my tasks were fairly independent too. In everything I did I was solely responsible for my work and allowed to get on with it, then it was checked/changed/continued as necessary.

Thanks to this internship I have got an entry-level job with a charity - it's not graduate level but it's great as a temporary foot in the door and I wouldn't have got it without the practical skills and experience gained from this internship. It was also just helpful to try something new, see if I liked it and get some direction on my career aspirations.

Within my department everyone is friendly and everyone shares their work/learnings with each other regularly, goes for chats over coffee etcetera. In general the office is quite chilled out and a really nice place to work. No one is too strict, the dress code is really relaxed. People are allowed to put headphones in and get their head down if they want to, as well. It's really easy going.

The internship was really well organised, I think a little more work is needed on the personal development pack but other than that it was great. We didn't hear loads from the intern team over the placement, but the structure of weekly one to one's with managers and a mid-placement review was really helpful and helped me to figure out what I wanted to gain from the internship and how I could maximise my opportunities.

I signed up for workshops put on for interns - one in cv and interview skills, one in public-speaking and presentations. These were very helpful and I'd like to see more of them, I definitely would have put my name down for extra training/development opportunities. CRUK's culture of learning is evident.

I would absolutely love to come back and work here in the future, I am already looking out for opportunities to apply to, such as the graduate scheme or any executive roles. There are really good benefits and it is just such a positive, friendly environment to work. I'll definitely be back!

Occasional drinks with my team was great, unfortunately I had a really long commute so I couldn't always stay very long and probably missed out. The interns didn't always get involved with each other, though a few of us kept up going for drinks each week - maybe if a few more events were organised and interns invited, they would all have gone and we could have socialised more. Instead it was left to us to organise and unfortunately people didn't get involved.

Expensive!

Expensive!