Analyst Intern Review

It was a great introduction to the Civil Service and because the Public Sector is where I am most interested in pursuing a career within, I was naturally interested to see how the Civil Service functions. This was a good introduction into how Britain much of the work in government is carried out - there is a perception that most policy making is driven top down whereas it is the other way around.

Very valued because they invested a lot of time in getting to know us. Naturally, many of the more senior colleagues were very busy and had limited time to interact with intern. However, full time employees on the Civil Service Fast Stream were particularly welcoming as many of them had been through the same internship as us.

A lot of support was given as there was an assumption that we were coming in knowing nothing about the workstreams we were placed on, although it was expected that we had an interest. As I was at the Office for National Statistics, the support included training in Excel and STATA.

Busy but not detrimentally so. There is a perception from outside circles that the Civil Service is a bit inert and that nothing gets done however, I found that to be far from the case during my internship - I was always tasked with responsibilities to be delivered by certain deadlines.

A lot of responsibility - I was producing client work throughout the internship, and was held to a high standard, although I was given a lot of support. This was even moreso because I was at the Office for National Statistics, where the accuracy of my work was scrutinised and rightly so.

Being trained in STATA helped me a lot when it came to working with data for my final year dissertation. Excel training will also be useful for my entire career, and this was the first internship in which I used it extensively. In terms of knowledge of the civil service a a whole, it has assisted me in my choice of career as I now have a strong theoretical knowledge of how it functions.

A great atmosphere - I was working with people who were generally only a few years older than me so we got on well. All staff members were very welcoming and I believe it has a lot to do with the fact that we all have chosen to work in the public sector rather than the private sector.

Well organised although some of the key information about the internship could have been given to us a bit earlier. The application process was also not entirely transparent as there were some additional steps to those that had been listed on the website. Nevertheless, there is only such an extent that a programme catering for so many people can be well organised.

A lot of investment in the technical side of things (Excel and STATA) as this was essential to my work. Soft skills such as presentation skills were not emphasized as much however. There were a few sessions on how to submit a successful application to the Civil Service fast stream that I found invaluable.

Decent - an internship within the Office for Statistics on the Civil Service Internship is a very marketable thing in an era where competition for public sector jobs is very high. The civil service itself is huge, and allows for quite a lot of movement between departments if one has the transferable skills.

There was a great social scene owing to the fact that fast stream full timers interacted a lot with the interns and that we were of a similar age group. It was easy to share interests with quite a lot of people both at the ONS and on the fast stream internship from other departments.

Not very high because it was Newport although because I stayed in the Newport student village, my rent was a bit higher than what would have been the case if I had rented from spareroom or other websites. This was in comparison to most interns from other departments who were working in London.

Not great

Yes - plenty of opportunities to socialise with other interns and full time workers. We also had bowling nights, drinks after work etc, which created a good atmosphere within the office. I continue to keep in touch with many of the people I worked with. Moreover, there was a high takeup of out of work activities.