Commercial Banking Penultimate Year Summer Internship Review

Thoroughly! I really enjoyed connecting with the intern community and building valuable connections with individuals in my placement as well as other places in the bank. It has been an amazing experience despite the shift to a virtual programme. I have learnt so much about HSBC and the GTRF business area and quickly realised that all employees are very willing to have a chat if you take the initiative to do so.

I felt extremely valued as an intern because everyone has been extremely welcoming and willing to speak and tell me about their role. I really enjoy the work culture at HSBC and the intern team gave us many exciting things to do in our time.

Support was available through numerous platforms such as the different learning sites and the people you can speak to. I found that whenever I struggled with concepts or did not understand some acronyms I had enough people to email and reach out to in order to clarify doubts. The learning sites have also been very useful in my development.

I learnt a lot of skills during a virtual internship such as resilience, working unusual hours because I did the internship from Singapore and virtual social skills. It was definitely something I had to adapt and get used to but the technology worked out well and zoom meetings ran smoothly. The skills I employed will definitely help me in starting my career in a more online/digitalized world.

I think the internship was structured really well. We still had our usual induction days and end of internship celebration events. At times it was a bit challenging to keep up with all the events or tools we could attend and leverage on as there is so much going on in just 5 weeks but all in all it was structured really well.

The atmosphere was consistently vibrant and pleasant. I loved meeting everyone who I worked with and the intern community this year bonded in ways we wouldn't have if the circumstances differed. We had regular Friday social nights where we got to bond with the interns really well and we had many calls as an intern cohort too.

The company helped out in every way possible to ensure we were constantly developing and growing. We had a whole development day that was for learning more about personal sustainability.

Although the internship was quite short (5 weeks), it definitely helped all us interns get a real taste for what it is like to work at HSBC and the work culture there. I found the atmosphere and environment thrilling through my screen so I am sure the in-person experience would be even better!

I gained a really good understanding of what the culture is like at HSBC from regular interactions with the people in my placement area, the intern programme community, my grad coach and on programme manager etc. Every single person I met was very inclusive.

The insight I got in my placement area was extremely valuable because I got exposure to different aspects. I got front line experience, product knowledge experience, digital experience and so on. This really helped shape my understanding of what it is like to work in my particular business area and how it fits in with the rest of the bank divisions.

The internship was paid work. We completed a virtual internship so there were no expenses to be reimbursed.

There were many chances to network and meet others in the company. HSBC is a very large and global bank with a very large scale of employees so there were always people I was introduced to and met.

We had a very good amount of social events and speaker series where we got to hear from very inspirational speakers and bond with the intern cohort.

We found out a good amount the D&I/ CSR of the bank where employees can get involved with the resource groups or carry out volunteering external to their work. This was really fascinating to hear about.

I would definitely recommend the experience, you learn a lot and you are constantly developing and acquiring skills to be more future ready. In a world that will likely become a lot more virtual and less in office experiences, the virtual internship has prepared me a lot to face the challenges that come with moving more online but also has made me ready to embrace the opportunities that come with this also.