Summer Software Engineer Intern Review

It was an amazing learning experience, which is what I typically look for in a good internship. The intern experience that was specifically created for remote work was very well thought out. It was lovely to actually have a busy schedule specifically dedicated to interns, rather than just being thrown into an office and left to work on our own. The only thing that I did not enjoy is the excessive meetings. Oftentimes felt like I was stuck in a day full of meetings without any time left to actually do my work.

The people that were chosen to work at J.P. Morgan are amazing. They're friendly, knowledgeable and are always there to help. I met a surprising amount of people who took time out of their day solely to talk to me and improve my skills, even though they've never met me before. Many were willing to give us lectures or learning sessions just to improve our commercial acumen. I can definitely say that I felt very valued and supported by my colleagues.

I think my manager was excellent in guiding us to the right answer, but not explicitly telling us what it is. He gave us all the right tools and pointed at people to talk to if we needed help. He was very supportive and understanding in our journey. The only problems that were arising were because the manager had too much work on his hands and did not have enough time to keep track of all the things that he had to take care of during our internship.

Maybe it was because I had less technical knowledge than a good amount of other people who were taken onto the programme, but I oftentimes felt like I had way too many things to do and too little time. Meetings were really eating up my time that should have been dedicated to hands-on coding. I found myself working after 5 at least 2 times a week. That being said, I am aware of people who had better skills than I did and glided through the internship no problem. I understand that it is hard to find a good balance in activities when the skill levels differ this much.

I think this internship struck the perfect balance in this field. One of my favourite parts was being given the ability to work on my own and manage my own tasks. I loved that we weren't being "babied", but at the same time were given opportunities to reach out for help if we felt we needed some. I think giving intern teams their own little projects to work on was an excellent decision, because it gave us just the right amount of responsibility by allowing us to choose our own solution and not overwhelming us with giant and complex projects.

The skills I picked up throughout my internship are already coming to be useful, as some of the information I learned is now being covered in my university lectures. The fantastic thing about working in a real business environment is trying out techniques and concepts that are actually useful in the industry, rather than old-school abstract ideas that are typically taught at universities. The InsideSherpa modules were especially excellent at this. The skills I picked up at J.P. Morgan even encouraged me to finally start working on various IT projects of my own.

One of my favourite things about J.P. Morgan is how informal it is in comparison with other competitors within the industry. The informal dress style, lack of complex business language, and employees that are very down to earth despite their high status within the company definitely make the whole experience much more relaxed and enjoyable. Everyone being approachable, offering their help and time also greatly improves the general rapport of employees, as well as the work atmosphere.

Obviously, as this was the first ever remote internship, there were some struggles here and there. Meetings that I wasn't supposed to attend appeared on my calendar on the regular. Some online sessions were overfilled and didn't have enough time for everyone to ask questions. Because of the way the GUI was designed, it was hard to understand which training was mandatory and which wasn't. Generally, the digital agenda was not useful in comparison to the regular outlook calendar. However, on the large, the company did a good job.

I could not praise J.P. Morgan enough for this. The vast amount of training and development modules that were available is amazing. If you ever had any free time, a brilliant way to use it was to choose a topic that interests you and complete training on it. The tech modules are many and in high quality, some even bought from third parties. I found them to be greatly helpful in my experience at J.P. Morgan and my IT career in general.

J.P. Morgan is a large enough of a company to give you any flexibility you need with your career. Would like to switch teams? You're good to go. Expand your skill portfolio? Just choose what you like. I personally had to reach out to them to see if I could get my internship offer changed into an Industrial Placement offer and had absolutely no issues in doing that. For the moment, I do not consider any other company as my employer in the tech industry.

The social scene was perfect. There were many opportunities to shmooze with fellow interns and many other employees within the firm, including various planned events, quizzes, chat rooms, lunch opportunities, networking sessions, speaker events, and others. We were often encouraged to spend a good amount of time networking with both, interns, and long-term employees. I can definitely say that I have made a number of great friends during my time at the company. I don't think there's any way the company could have made it any better over the internet.

Work was remote, so you could choose where you wanted to be while you worked! :)

Work was remote, so you could choose where you wanted to be while you worked, but there's no other place in the world with the nightlife as amazing as Glasgow!

Definitely. I wish I had time to do everything I wanted to do. The company actively encourages participating in various Business Resource Groups, even going as far as volunteering company hours to various non-profits and charity organisations. If you have an interest, there's going to be a community for it at J.P. Morgan. The company even hosts events outside of work hours for employees to have fun. I have participated in many of those activities and managed to make great friends in the meantime.