Spring Intern - Markets and Securities Services Review

My attitude definitely improved as the week went on and I met more people and saw more parts of the business. At the beginning of the week I felt a bit lost on the floor, especially as many people were too busy to commit time to speaking to me and I had a very low initial level of knowledge that made it difficult to follow what they were doing without that explanation. I think the placement could be improved particularly for interns in busier areas such as the trading floor by having an initial induction into that division, in order to understand what the different sections on the floor are, and maybe even a basic introduction to why clients might trade different products, and what sort of clients each desk mostly deals with. Having to find someone myself with the time to give me this insight means I still didn't have some pieces of experiential understanding of each desk until very late in the week when it had less value for the internship.

At the beginning of the week I found it more difficult to connect with people because I often got the impression that people didn't think that I was worth giving up the time for - as opposed to just that they were too busy to give up the time. This was due to people's attitudes towards the interns. However, this turned out to only be the case for the people who I interacted with at the beginning of the week, and as I branched out and met more people I found on the whole that everyone was extremely supportive and inclusive, happy to recommend who I should spend time with and get me in touch with them, and made me feel extremely welcome on their desks. Separate to my time on the floor, the recruitment team from HR was phenomenal, and answered questions and dealt with issues extremely efficiently and discretely. The style of introductions on the first day, where they rotated round the tables while we were eating breakfast, was a great way of getting to know them and feel like they knew us too. They really helped to make us feel valued and welcome and I appreciate their support throughout the week so much.

Without a formal induction onto the trading floor, having to find information for myself was a good challenge, however slowed down the learning process of the week. The graduates on rotation were definitely the best resource for guidance as they could explain their desks in the most straightforward way, considering they had only learnt it recently themselves. In order to improve the placement, it would be useful to have more information about the other divisions in the introduction at the beginning of the week as well as the opportunity to explore our own during the week. This would make it easier to decide whether we wanted to stay in our own division or change over with regards to the Assessment Centres for Summer 2019. It was clear that some people on the floor were able to explain the structure of the division and the bank as a whole better than other people, and as a result some interns got a much better insight into the was the division works than others simply by circumstance. It might be useful if, before splitting straight onto desks for work shadowing at the beginning of the afternoon, the interns could split into their divisions to get a uniform base level of understanding for the floor. This would also increase our confidence going into work shadowing, because a common base level of knowledge would allow us to better formulate questions throughout the week, and would also allow our line managers to structure an initial explanation of the desk for us which builds on the group introduction.

While I don't think the knowledge I've gained will directly influence my studies, I will certainly be able to apply my experience to future job opportunities and applications. Having come in with a fairly low level of insight about the business and the factors that influence the markets, I have a much greater appreciation now for how politics and economics tie together to make huge differences to the world's markets, and will be able to identify similar influences when I read the news from now on.

While having such a large amount of unstructured work shadowing put a responsibility on the interns which emphasized independence, I think it may have been too unstructured for a spring week where many interns are only getting their first insight into a large company like Citi, or somewhere as complex as the trading floor. Leaving responsibility for the interns' guidance and education completely to their line managers meant that some interns on the floor had a much more valuable week than others, who felt like they had to spend more time just finding their way around and looking for people to speak to than getting a well-rounded view of the division. The insight week could benefit from a more structured start, perhaps with all of the interns from one division being given an introduction to the floor together, and then evolve to unstructure work shadowing later in the week. Especially on the trading floor where there are fewer tasks that an intern is actually able to do, more guidance should be given to the managers to introduce their interns to people on the floor or suggest places they can go and sit, and the managers should be sure at the beginning of the week that they are able to be present for their interns and give them some guidance, so that interns aren't left completely on their own in terms of ensuring the week is valuable without knowing any methods to achieve that.

The best talks during the week were about Citi's diversity networks, corporate social responsibility, the AI presentation and the guidance for assessment centres. The division-specific talk on the first day was a bit too in-depth however may have been useful if it was brought back to a more general understanding of the division. The networking at Pizza Pilgrims was excellent, and was a much more comfortable environment than the networking the night before. Perhaps if their order was swapped round, so that interns had one extra day of experience in their division to talk about in the more formal networking setting and were also more comfortable with the tone of networking in general, the evening activities could have been improved further. The work shadowing was not dull, however could benefit from a little more structure to make sure that there was less downtime when interns were struggling to find people to sit with and talk to.

Although at the beginning of the week it sometimes felt like no one wanted to invest any time or effort into explaining to me what they were doing - separately from simply being too busy - throughout the week, and especially thanks to the lunchtime talks and catchup with the recruitment team, it did start to feel like I was a valued part of the team. There were no points at which I specifically felt like Citi explicitly indicated its investment in us as future employees - instead everything felt fairly speculative which may have decreased our confidence about achieving a place on the Summer Placements - so perhaps the spring week could help to improve confidence by having a more explicitly positive message about Citi's investment in us.

The big benefit of the work shadowing was being able to see what life really is like day-to-day for employees in the division. This seemed particularly prominent for the Markets division, where the job seems to be similar day to day and employees receive a large responsibility as soon as they join and keep the same level of responsibility, as opposed to in a division such as Investment Banking where, although the job is integrated between grades, more junior employees like the interns were given lower level tasks to complete during their week.

I wouldn't say the work shadowing gave me a significant insight into the company culture, however I was given a highly positive view of the environment of Citi by my interactions with the recruitment team. They were all extremely supportive and helpful, being able to give us their own insights into the recruitment process and their advice about the divisions we were working in, and also dealt with issues that arose during the week extremely well. I am definitely coming away from the spring week knowing that Citi has the sort of environment I would be comfortable working in.

I think we could have benefited from being encouraged to see the networking events as opportunities to learn about other divisions as this would have given me a more rounded view of the opportunities available to me at Citi, and I wish in hindsight I had asked more questions to senior members from other divisions which gave an idea about their division rather than just about their time in Citi. However, the spring week did give me a unique look into my division which would have been impossible for me to gain otherwise, which I really appreciate.

I did not claim any expenses during the week, however I was given the option to stay in a nearby hotel and was able to have my meals reimbursed if I needed them to be. We were also provided with several meals throughout the week including dinner. The spring week was not a paid placement.

The unstructured work shadowing meant that we could meet many different people on our floor and gain insight from them throughout the week. The two networking events were both useful and successful, however I definitely felt more comfortable at the second one which was much more informal, as I felt I could talk more honestly and ask more fundamental questions to the analysts there.

The Pizza evening was a really excellent social opportunity to chat and bond with the other interns, as well as providing a casual environment to honestly talk to Citi's employees in. The formal Networking event felt a bit more forced, but could have been more useful if it came later in the week or after the casual social so that we felt more confident telling the senior members about our weeks, and about talking to them and asking them questions in general.

Through asking my own questions I was able to understand the work-life balance of working at Citi and gain some insight into how working environment of the firm and the division. I didn't explicitly learn about the activities that employees can get involved with outside of work, however it was useful to understand the expected working hours for my division and how this can balance with out-of-work activities. Similarly learning about the diversity networks within Citi was very useful, although I would have liked to hear more about the activities that these networks organize for Citi employees.

I would recommend the insight week to a friend on the provision that they were able to gain more insight into the Markets division than I did before joining so they were prepared for the unstructured feel of the work shadowing. I had difficulty doing this as it is apparent to me that lots of the understanding has to come from experiencing the floor itself - so the ideal solution would be that the structure of the week changes to include a more division-specific introduction for the interns. Then this lack of insight would not have felt like as much of an issue and the week would feel even more valuable.