Insurance Consulting Summer Student Review

I had a varied and interesting internship. I was part of the Insurance team, which meant I got to experience work from both Life and General insurance. This meant that the work remained varied, and there were always people to ask for more work if my workload was low. The work was normally interesting and was generally real actuarial work.

My colleagues were incredibly welcoming and I felt part of the team from day one. They had regular social events that the summer students were always invited along to - we even had to organise two socials ourselves. Whenever I did work for a colleague they were always grateful and would thank me personally, while also giving me feedback on what I could improve for my next piece of work.

I was assigned a mentor who was always available to answer my questions when I had them. She also had lots of work to give me when I was running out. On top of guidance from my mentor, I also had a mid term and final review, where I met with the coordinator for the summer student programme, and she talked me through the feedback I had been given by colleagues for pieces of work I had submitted. In this way I was able to adjust how I worked when appropriate.

In general I was kept relatively busy, although during the early part of the internship there were times when I was low on work. This was mainly because I was still taking part in training sessions at this point, and so I was not yet ready to get involved in real client work. For the second half of the internship I was much more busy, although there was never the expectation to stay beyond 5:15pm, and my work with high priority deadlines was well managed so I didn't become swamped.

A lot of the work I was doing was real client work, so there was an expectation on me not to make mistakes and to check that my results seemed sensible. All this work would later be checked by a superior, but this is standard process in the company, even if you are a graduate who has been with them for a few years. Even the non client work I was given were development projects that were valuable to the company and hadn't just been designed to keep us busy.

Personally my degree course is not that relatable to actuarial work, although some of the programming skills I have picked up will be useful. The actuarial training was detailed, and if I do pursue a career as an actuary I feel far better informed in the kind of work I would be doing, and I would be ready to start proper actuarial work much more quickly than if I had not done this internship.

The office is friendly and welcoming, you always feel like you can ask a question if you become stuck on something. Socials were regular and people were always willing to have a general chat with you during the day. When people left the office we would have leaving drinks and speeches on them, which was fun.

There was a clear structure to the internship which meant that I was kept busy. As well as day to day tasks set by members of the team we were also given weekly exercises which we were assessed on and feedback was given. On top of this we were also told to prepare a short presentation on a topic of our choice for a team meeting.

For the first few weeks of the internship we had regular training sessions on presentations, meaning we were quickly introduced to some of the key skills that we would have to use during our internship. Regular feedback on work also gave me the chance to realise mistakes I was making and adapt the way I worked in future.

Jobs are offered directly from the internship, with new joiners starting the following September (after completing their final year at university). It seems that joining as a new graduate is a case of continuing on the work you did as a summer student, so you get a good impression of the work you will be doing going forward during the summer. Typically not everyone is hired from the internship, but places are available if you perform.

There were 5 interns in the office, and we were involved in a strong social scene in the office. There were socials most weeks on top of the Friday pub trip, so there were certainly lots of opportunities to socialise! Many of the socials we organised ourselves so we felt well involved.

Central London, so naturally accommodation and food/drink prices were very high. Living close to the office would be incredibly expensive but getting the tube in from cheaper areas further afield was no hassle. There are cheap places to eat if you know where to look, same of course with drinking!

Expensive, but very good. The company paid for our tickets on a boat party down the Thames one Friday night, which was fun as we got to meet other people from both BW and other actuarial firms. There are so many pubs and bars to visit after work, meaning you never have to go to the same place twice!

The socials mentioned above were the main activities, on top of that there were regular yoga sessions and office cricket matches, as well as a 18-hole golf match with a barbecue! The company is incredibly social and year round seem to hold lots of different events for all to enjoy.