Investment consulting intern Review

The role within Aon (investment consulting) closely matched the job discription provided on the careers website. during the training, there were also social activities such as meals out which gave plenty of time to socialise with the other interns. on a more day to day basis, the work was in no way repetitve, and there was plenty of scope to work on interesting projects.

The team made me feel extremely welcome right from the start, they spent a lot of time talking me through clients and how to complete tasks (even though it would have just been faster for them to do it themselves, they gave me the chance to complete the work under their supervision). the graduates often had socials and made special effort to ensure the interns and IP's were invited.

There was a structured goal setting session at the start of the intership, followed by detailed feedback at the end. on a day to day basis though most of the support came from the graduates. weekly feedback sessions would have been helpful to try and work out what to improve on.

Although the workload was slightly slow at the start, i was quickly invited to work on clients. towards the end i was working later than 5:30, but i was usually out by 6 and the work was very interesting and engaging. i did notice some of my colleagues were working quite long hours though.

Towards the end of the internship, the team gave me autonamy to email fund managers, check documents and produce first drafts of reports. This made it feel like i was doing actual work, rather than "intern projects" that some other firms focus on.

There were quite a few online training programs that interns worked there way through, including excel skils. there was also a social impact project that gave a lot of opportunity to practice presenation and public speaking skills.

the office was entirely open plan and worked on a hot desking system, this meant you could sit near to the people who were giving you work, and could also sit next to new people every day. there was a snack desk that always had food on, and the office was very clean. every desk had a docking station with a large monitor.

there were 3 training days at the start, aswell as a day in london at the end in which interns could present their projects. there were also weekly training "lunch and learns" which covered a wide variety of skills inluding things such as personal finance. more regular feedback would have been helpful however.

they covered all expenses during the three training days as well as the day in london. graduates also get a lot of personal study days to work towards their personal qualifications such as the CFA. a wide variety of online training resources were also provided via a system known as AON university.

having worked extremely closely with the graduates, i can see how appealing working here is. the work life balance is excellent compared to other finance firms. there is also a lot of opportunity to get professional qualifications with a large amount of support from the firm. the day to day job has also been extremely enjoyable

it was extremely social during the training, however due to being based in a regional office, there was only a few summer placement students. this contrasted with how many there were based in the london office. the graduates in my office did take special care to ensure we were invited to social events however.

it was more expensive than a lot of citys, but still vastly cheaper than going out in london. there were a large number of good cheap lunch places around the office. the office was literally next to the train station, so getting to the office was very easy and cheap

there were a huge number of bars and clubs within walking distance of the office. the public transport also runs very late in the city which meant that you didnt need to get a taxi home. It was always busy on a friday night and there are bars to cover all price points and tastes.

the team always went for drinks on payday, and sometimes went for the drinks or food on a friday night. some of the grads did try and run more team wide socials, however the uptake from the more senior members of the team often wasnt good. all the grads eat lunch together every day which is nice though