Intern Review

I thoroughly enjoyed my internship at EDF Trading, and the work that I was given to do really helped me to enhance my overall experience in my chosen field. The project allowed for me to start from an idea, and among with another intern plan and implement the idea, and then to present this to the CIO.

I felt valued by my colleages throughout the internship, and always felt like I could turn to them if I was struggling with a problem. After finishing the project, I felt even more valued, in the way that I had provided something of use for them.

I found that I was left to my own devices quite a lot, which worked extremely well with the isolated project that I was working on. It allowed my to build up my experience in independent work. But, even though there wasn't a huge amount of guidance, the support was always there if I needed it.

For the good majority of the internship there was plenty of work to do, and only on rare occasions was there a lull in work. I'm thankful for this, as having nothing to do can take a toll on you.

With the independent nature of the project that I was working on, there wasn't much responsibility put in me. However there were little jobs that I was given, that did make me feel like I was being given responsibilities.

The experiences and skills that I developed over the course of the internship will definitely assist me in my university studies, and hopefully in my career after I graduate.

The atmosphere at EDF Trading was very friendly, professional, and all in all a very comfortable place to work. There was never a point where I didn't feel like I could talk to someone, or ask them for help if I was stuck. Having the other interns also made the transition into the work environment even easier as everyone was in the same boat.

The internship was set up very well, with all of the interns coming together for lunch every couple of weeks, to learn about other parts if the business. Along with this, everything was planned to a tee, so that there were no issues when it came to it. The work planned easily fit the timeframe, and didn't leave me bored, or in need of work.

EDF Trading invested a lot in training the interns in a wide variety of knowledge of the business. With presentations almost every week, explaining what the different areas of the business did, and how it worked. There was even a lot of time invested in training for the presentations that we would give. All of this knowledge and the skills will help after the internship, as much as it helped during it.

Due to the fact that I still had two years left of University at the end of the internship, I didn't enquire into any possible positions in the company. The reasons for this were that I didn't know what I would want to do after I finished my course, whether it was going to be to go into the workplace, or to possibly do a PhD. So, for these reasons I didn't enquire into any positions.

All of the interns got along extremely well, since we all started at roughly the same time. This meant that we became quite close during the internship, and spent the majority of lunch times together, and went for a drink at the end of the week, on most weeks. This helped to bring us all closer together and made the internship much nicer.

Since the internship was in the middle of London, the price of everything was quite high, from lunch to drinks after work. Luckily for me I didn't have to live in London, but if I did it would have cost quite a big proportion of what I was being paid to pay for rent. But the opportunity to work in London for that period was definitely worth it for me.

The nightlife in the area that I worked was fairly decent, with a plethora of different pubs and bars within easy walking distance of the building. This made it a lot easier to socialise after work, and to hang out. I was very happy with the different forms of nightlife that were present around the building, and would be quite happy to work there for that reason.

There were a few different opportunities to get involved in activities outside of work, by doing things such as charity runs. All of these things were not for me however, and so there wasn't that much for me to do outside of work. However, there was a company fun day at the end of my first week working there, and that was one of the best experiences from the entire internship.