Finance Intern Review

I have really enjoyed my internship with Santander, I have had the opportunity to get involved with various tasks as well as work alongside the other interns in a charity project. My colleagues have been supportive from the start which I believe has helped me develop my skills further which I can bring back to university life.

I felt very valued by colleagues, especially by those in my team. They were all so supportive and gave me a lot of responsibility which made me feel like I was adding value to the company. They were always more than happy to help if I didn't understand something and appreciated the tasks I did complete which helped me settle into the team quite quickly.

I felt support and guidance was always available from my team and I felt comfortable to ask for help or ask questions when necessary. My manager and buddy in particular were hugely supportive and would always make the time to explain how different processes worked and why they were done like that. I had a weekly 1-1 which gave me the opportunity to reflect on my week and ask my manager to get involved with other things which she was always more than happy to organise for me.

From the second week of my internship, I became responsible for completing one the daily tasks which involved 4 different working files, in addition, I would have the opportunity to get involved with other monthly and daily tasks which kept me busy. I found my work load was an excellent balance and I have learnt a lot from it.

I felt I was given quite a lot of responsibility during my time at Santander, I became responsible for completing 4 of the working files to calculate leverage ratios, I had the opportunity to work on a document that got published alongside the half year report. By getting involved with these tasks I felt like I was adding value to the company.

In such a short space of time, I feel I developed various skills, key ones including communication, ability to work under pressure and excel skills. I am certain this will assist me in my studies and beyond as completing my dissertation will require continuous communication with my tutor and learning to balance my work. In addition, I believe that excel is a program that every company will use in the future as it's such an advanced tool in finance.

I felt very comfortable in my workplace and always felt the culture of the company was very friendly and approachable. Everyone was always more than willing to help and the atmosphere remained positive even when things got busy. My team were very hard working but also had a good work and social life balance which was a great opportunity to talk about different things and get to know them better.

I felt the internship was very well organised from the moment I completed my assessment centre, they were very quick with their responses and gave a good level of detail back to all of us. At the start of the internship, all interns were invited to an induction in Leicester which was very well structured and gave us the opportunity to network with other interns and get to know more about the company. In addition, throughout our internship, we were involved in various webinars to have an insight into different things, e.g. customer experience and business change. I felt very happy on my internship and felt support was always provided when I needed it.

All interns had the opportunity to have one to one's with their managers on a weekly basis to discuss what went well that week and what we could improve on. We also had the opportunity to fill out learning logs on a weekly basis which gave us an opportunity to reflect on our week and identify what skills we had improved.

I would love to join the graduate scheme at Santander, I think it is very well structured and everyone offers great support. I really like the idea of having the opportunity to go through 3 different rotations as well as completing the ACCA or CIMA qualification. I think it's a great way to learn, network and develop interpersonal skills.

There was a great social scene amongst interns and colleagues within my team, we would all make an effort to ensure we did something after work, e.g. go for some drinks. This gave us the opportunity to learn about other roles within the business and also get to know each other better. We would try to make this happen every couple to few weeks.

Cost of living - N/A Socialising - Socialising outside of work could be quite expensive as we were based in central London, however, you are getting paid for the internship and there were various places that you could go which would offer 2 for 1 drinks and have the opportunity to try new places.

The nightlife was great in the area that I worked in, there was a range of different places that everyone could go to, i.e restaurants, bars, cinemas. I believe we worked in an area where there was something for everyone. As mentioned previously, after exploring the area we found slightly cheaper places where drinks were discounted which was great for students.

There were so many opportunities to get involved in, whether this was organised by other interns or colleagues at work. I had the opportunity to attend a Finance half year event where I was able to network with new people as well go out with some of the other interns for drinks some Fridays to get to know them better.