Actuarial Intern Review

I found it to be a very supporting environment and I had dedicated, enthusiastic colleagues. However, sometimes I felt office politics was slowing down work and the team's capacity to deliver valuable work.

This could really vary depending on what job/who you were working with. Often on audits you've worked on for a while there's a debrief to reward you for all your work. Other times, like any job, you can struggle to get on with everyone on your team (this was very rare though). On jobs where the hours were long managers did often make the effort to thank everyone, even if it was by just taking them out for lunch.

As you work with different people depending on what job you are currently working on, it's not like a usual working environment where you work for a long period directly for one manager. PwC assigns each employee with a people manager and you occasionally have catch ups. However, on each job coaching by more senior people is strongly encouraged so it's not an issue if you don't have a clue.

Due to the nature of the work, there wasn't a constant flow of work which made some periods quite busy. However, I think it my responsibility to manage that and know when to refuse additional tasks.

Quite a lot as you are often assigned areas to complete from start to finish, but there was always someone to help you if you didn't understand something.

I took 7 out 15 ACA exams during my placement. I also worked on the audits of a variety of different clients so I gained a lot of knowledge around how a number of different businesses work not just PwC.

You can quite often be at a client site rather than in the office, on nearly all of my jobs I've found the people on my team really easy to get along with.

We were treated exactly the same as the first year graduates so we followed mostly the same structure as they did.It was partly structured and partly my choice of work. I was often asked what I would like to do in order to make the most out of this experience.

I did not have a lot of formal training, but the firm's learning model states that 70% of learning should be done on the job so we are encouraged to learn as we go.

Currently applying for a job with the same company, but in a different department that fits more with my university degree subject.

The placement group in my department was very close, meeting every week for lunches and socials. With other colleagues I organised socials for the team and I also got involved in a few employee led networks.

The office I worked in was in the London Bridge area, so it was quite expensive, but I thought the salary covered those costs.

Loads of bars and pubs to go out in after work. Great atmosphere!

Almost every week I participated in debates about politics, gender, security or society with the respective networks representing those topics. PwC organises a charitable pantomime and they also have a presence at Pride in London, both of which have given me some of the best memories of this year