Summer Associate Review

As an intern my work was spread around a few different teams in the department. Effectively I was picking up jobs around the department, which meant I got a breadth work and met nearly everyone. I did a lot of work on PowerPoint, Excel, and Word. Excel was probably the tool I used the most. My work was event-based (due to my department), so projects would come and go, but all the interns had a common 'Community Project' where we create something that benefits society financially.

New Skills I have learned; I have learned how an office works, and how to be a confident professional within one. This includes communication in real life and online. I have learned a great deal of technical stuff, including specific industry knowledge, regulation knowledge, and software knowledge. Skills I have developed; My excel has improved a lot. My ability to read expansive documents and pull out key information has improved a lot. My collaborative nature.

I was given a decent amount of responsibility, but not to the point where I was overwhelmed. Any work I did do went through my manager first, which ensured that I didn't send out something that wasn't perfect to the wider FCA community. However, work I did was directly used by manager in certain projects. I was exposed to high-level meetings with high-level stakeholders and, whilst I didn't really speak in any of them, it was great to be a part of.

The support at the FCA is fantastic. There is a multi-level system where I received support from; my grad buddy (in the form of bi-weekly meetings), support staff (department specific but all very nice), the other interns, my team, and my manager. If you have an issue, there will be someone you can talk about it with. I would have liked perhaps more formal guidance as I think the guidance interns get can vary greatly depending on where they are.

The company culture is great. There is a clear effort within the FCA to be very kind and everyone I have spoken to is happy to chat. The diversity & inclusion here is also great and is clearly something that is focussed on a lot. There are quite a few interns so it is easy to make friends and do stuff with them. I would say, quite hard too get involved in any company activities if you are an intern.

I have had a great time on my internship. I have not been overworked and my work-life balance has been respected, but I have also had the chance to do some actual and meaningful work. It was a good balance. I have met some great and very interesting people at the FCA - there is definitely no shortage of that. It exceeded expectations. The internship is a great advert for a full time job, I think!

Yes

1. Know about the FCA - one of the biggest things in the application process was simply knowing the FCA's mission and its specific actions. I did significant research in that before and they specifically asked about it - so I'd recommend doing this. 2. Be yourself/honest - the FCA want a diverse range of talent, not just maths stars who live and breathe economics. 3. Show that you care about what the FCA does - public service.