Business Analyst- Summer Intern Review

All summer interns work on a project, mine was interesting and I had a lot of choice in the direction it would take. In many cases interns' work will be used to guide future work by economists in the bank so it is satisfying to know your work is important.

Although my team was mainly senior employees at the Bank which didn't offer the chance to connect with recent graduates/joiners, I was made welcome and everyone was offering to answer any questions or queries throughout the internship. It really showed that they valued my presence as well.

I had regular meetings with my line manager with a lot of opportunities for feedback. My manager also arranged for me to go on a course to learn to use statistical software which was very helpful in working on my project.

On occasions I have been extremely busy especially when my manager has been on leave and I have had to cover his work, and there have been occasions where I haven't had too much work to do but overall my work load has been optimal.

During the internship I had a lot of autonomy in deciding how to do my project. All of the interns I spoke to this year (including myself) found that we were responsible for projects that really mattered.

My internship was very useful for developing skills, as mentioned above I was sent on a course to learn how to use statistical software. I also learnt a lot about empirical econometrics which I hadn't learned in my degree yet. I also learnt more about data analysis, which is important in a working environment but generally not dealt with in academic economics.

The people I worked with were very friendly, and I found that economists in the Bank are generally very approachable and happy to help if I was having difficulties. People can also be very busy however so there is not always a lot of interaction.

The organisation before the internship started was not clear and efficient. But from the induction onwards, contact via emails was regular when needed and it was easy to raise any queries which were answered promptly. The staff who organised the internship were approachable and honest.

The Bank encourages personal development hugely with weekly events/ seminars /talks across the Bank. As an intern this was really useful and training was offered where needed. The scope of the training available was quite diverse. However, on some courses, numbers are limited which can be quite annoying if you can't sign up in time.

I would be very happy to work at the Bank in the future, they perform extremely interesting economic research and there are a lot of opportunities to get involved in extra projects with other people working at the Bank.

We were encouraged to socialise as a sandwich student group by our recruiters and the students that we replaced and this made the whole experience far more enjoyable.

The Bank is in the financial district in central London, so it is unlikely to be cheap. There are a number of pubs nearby that are reasonably priced, it's probably best to find these on the internet and book a table in advance.

There are a lot of pubs/bars nearby which are always popular on Friday nights. I went to a few of these with the other interns. The nightlife seems to be very good in this area, but I wasn't there long enough to experience a lot of it personally.

There is a gym on site. The Bank also has a sports club at Roehampton which interns get free access to. This has a wide array of sports teams rugby, cricket, football etc and a variety of teams which play for fun or competitively.