Advisory Intern Review

From start to finish, I have thoroughly enjoyed the last 6 weeks with EY. I have learnt a lot about the working world and what it has to offer, and it is an experience I am unlikely to forget. I have at no point felt out of place or unwelcome, everyone has been really friendly and approachable, and the work I completed has in no way felt irrelevant.

Being an intern, I felt that I would be treated slightly differently or with more hesitation. This has been far from the case; my team have made me feel at home, treating me the same way they would a graduate. My opinions and ideas never went unnoticed and I was given so many opportunities I did not expect to get being an intern.

Everyone from management to graduates looked out for me and gave me support and guidance wherever and whenever I needed it. I think it was especially useful that a lot of the team had initially been interns as well so were fully empathetic of my situation. EY also offer a buddy and counsellor system which was invaluable, but I felt like everyone on the team took an equal share of those roles.

I cannot think of the last day I was not busy - as soon as one piece of work finished, I sought out more and my team always had something else lined up. This was where being equally valued in the team really helped as my team were never hesitant to give me (often demanding) work and allow me to rise to the challenge, make mistakes, and learn.

Most of the work that I was set was required for actual client audits, so this placed a lot of responsibility on my shoulders to complete the work to a high standard. However, my team were always willing to take some of the burden (whenever I asked) and were always happy to review and feedback on my work.

This is a harder one to answer as the skills I developed on the internship will hardly ever be used in my degree, but will 100% be useful once I get a job. The development I made in managing my work-life balance, understanding office etiquette and interacting with clients (among other things) will be invaluable post university wherever I end up.

The atmosphere in the office was very upbeat and positive. I always looked forward to coming into work. From the first few days, it almost felt like a more grown-up version of uni life. On the days where a lot of the team were on client site, the vibrancy died down which was quite nice (and allowed more productivity) between the more busy days.

The internship was set up fairly well, with a good opening induction day and leaving event. With regards to the work itself, I would like to have had a bit more of a transparent idea of where I would be when at the start of each week, but I was still able to manage without difficulty. Plus, with everyone being very approachable, arranging work for myself on occasion was not an issue.

The firm were clearly interested in our own personal development, issuing each intern a counselor to personally support us and make sure we are making the most of the internship. The firm also put on weekly lunch and learn meetings where we could learn more about the firm and the opportunities we could get now and in our future careers, if we were to come back.

Once you get the internship, unless you make a really bad impression, it is pretty much yours to lose. So long as you are enthusiastic, make an effort to get on well with the team and get involved with as much as you can, you will get strong feedback which should put you in good stead to get the grad offer.

As interns, we organised a couple of nights out, and I played squash several times with one of the interns. Likewise with the team I was in, there were quite a few social events and I was invited to a lot of them. Sometimes the weekends were a little boring, but I traveled around the city and rested for the next week of work - but overall, the social scene was really good!

The cost of living and socialising was on the pricier side, but was relatively alright compared to our salaries and the fact that we were in the capital city.

I was in Edinburgh during the Fringe festival - enough said.

To be honest, there wasn't much to get involved with outside of work - being only 6 weeks meant there wasn't much time.