Summer Diversity Intern Review

On the Civil Service Internship I worked in the Department of Energy and Climate Change. I had a fantastic time during my two months there which helped me to decide to apply for the Civil Service Fast Stream. I gained a deeper understanding of the inner workings of government and policy whilst meeting some inspirational people and having fun on the job!

I was given a lot of responsibility from day one of my internship. I wrote briefings for my colleagues before they attended meetings with external companies, arranged a number of essential stakeholder meetings and collated the comments/opinions from those meetings to inform future policy changes. I also completed an extensive research project, presenting my findings to members of the whole office in my final week. I felt that my contributions were valued and that I was helping the team in meaningful ways.

I was assigned a Fast Stream mentor for my personal learning and development needs. We met on a weekly basis where I could talk about any issues I was having with my work or any challenges I was facing. It was really beneficial to talk to someone of a similar age to me, who was also quite junior but with two years of experience in the Civil Service. I gained a great deal of insight from this mentoring support. My line-manager was also very helpful and supportive, arranging catchups whenever necessary and always on hand for me to ask questions. I felt well supported in my role from both of these individuals as well as the rest of the team.

This varied on a day to day basis. Initially most of my work was setting up external meetings as I had to source appropriate contacts, arrange potential meeting dates and confirm attendees. With over 20 representatives from different companies this was very time consuming. Some days were quieter than others but I was rarely bored and alongside my office work I participated in a number of internship-related activities such as shadowing and workshops.

I was really pleased to have a lot of responsibility during my internship - the work that I carried out was essential to the running of the team and future activities. I prepared colleagues for external meetings, wrote briefings, set up scoping meetings and consolidated comments and opinions in a useful format for future reference.

This internship was my first experience in a corporate, professional environment. Therefore a lot of the skills I picked up were related to working in an environment such as that - which has been invaluable in my current job. For example I have learnt how to deal with difficult meetings in which both sides are trying to negotiate an outcome or convince someone else of their viewpoint. This is a situation which often comes up in the working work and I have been exposed to a number of different ways of dealing with it from being on the internship. Learning how to take minutes in meetings, write up summaries of discussion, find appropriate contacts in external companies and also just how to conduct yourself in an office environment are all things I picked up whilst working for the Civil Service.

The office was always very busy but not quiet. I quickly learnt how to ask for help in a way that did not disturb my colleagues. Although everyone was very focused and normally busy, my particular team was quite relaxed and we often shared a laugh and a joke during the day. In general everyone was super friendly and willing to offer advice over a cup of coffee.

I started my internship after another intern in the team so my line manager was already aware of everything I would need when arriving in the workplace. My security pass and IT equipment were all ready for me to begin and I knew on the first day what I'd be working on for the next two months. From a HR perspective there were some definite problems. I was informed by HR that I'd obtained a place and had a contract sent over with the basic details. My team then sent me some initial e-mails however although they knew who I was, I had no idea who my line manager or colleagues were - which meant we had to make some awkward introductions via e-mail to clear everything up. Another error occurred when someone entered the interns on the wrong payroll scheme - meaning we weren't paid until our department head kicked up a fuss with HR over us not being paid for 6 weeks. Amusingly, I received my contract from the department on the final day of my internship.

There were a number of internship activities to take advantage of, set up by the Civil Service and not our specific departments. This enabled all the interns from across departments to meet, get to know each other and share knowledge. I was able to shadow in other departments and find out about various career paths in the Civil Service and it felt like there was a good balance of events/activities.

Based on my experience on this internship, I am really keen to return to the Civil Service. I have seen the level of responsibility expected of Fast Streamers, and heard from colleagues who have been on the scheme themselves - learning about how they found their time on the Fast Stream and where they have gone since then.

Yes, the team often went for after work drinks and celebrated birthdays/special events. Leaving presentations were also very common and the interns arranged a number of social activities throughout the internship.

Being London, things were quite expensive. However bringing in your own lunch as opposed to buying it every day makes a massive difference. The department canteen was subsidised with a cheap Costa in the entrance too.

The nightlife was great with a range of venues/music to suit everyone's taste. I was also in a central location which made getting to places after work very easy.

Yes, as part of the internship we took part in a charity fundraising challenge - my team held a pub quiz and raffle which helped us to win the challenge. In terms of work-related activities outside of work there wasn't a great deal to get involved in.