Corporate & Consumer Strategy intern Review

It was an incredibly enriching experience where I really explored the breadth of strategy work, I was given responsibility and my work has directly contributed to the valuable output of this team to the wider organisation. A combination of my team and the interesting and impactful work I was given meant that this was one of the best internships I’ve ever been on.

One of the aims of my line manager was to make sure that I felt the work I was involved in mattered to the team which they went above & beyond to do. They always took any of my queries seriously too and were always open to having a fresh set of eyes look over the work. I did not interact much with the more senior members of my team but they were always available to speak if I wanted to

My work really stretched me so I did need a lot of support and guidance to be able to complete it but my managers had struck the right balance between not spoon-feeding my the answers and making me use my time wisely with. There are also many opportunities to improve your employability such as interview and CV workshops to different strategies on tackling presentation nerves.

I was busy for most of the internship, the first couple of weeks was me settling in but then I grew accustom to the work and didn’t feel as stretched for 2 weeks in the middle of the internship before the start of my ‘real’ project. Once I got stuck into my project I was very busy and worked very hard on that for the 2nd half of my internship, so I’ve had a nice mixture. At times it did feel like I had too little work and then too much work however.

I was in charge of an e-bulletin that would get sent out every week and that was a nice piece of work that I could claim as my own particularly at the beginning. This e-bulletin got sent to 400+ employees at CRUK so it was an important responsibility to shoulder. With my project I had complete responsibility over that too which was daunting at first but my manager helped me become at ease with it.

I had graduated the same year I did my internship so I brought skills from my education into the role instead. I was able to refine my data analysis abilities having spent a lot of time of my project using excel, analysing data from the charity commission and annual reports so I do feel ready to tackle real world business projects then just the theory around it. Particularly In the strategy team there is large focus on creating work that is visually impactful while being able to explain key takeaways in as concise a matter as possible. This will be useful in many careers I believe

It was a very friendly environment and it was very easy getting to know people from different teams throughout the organisation, at times the team would be very quiet and focussed on their work. I didn’t find the office environment too disruptive or too quiet at any point during my internship.

I found it very organised and at no point did I feel that I was a loose cog at Cancer Research UK, the first week was great in settling me in with an induction day and also an introductory meeting with each member of my team. There was also a day set up just to sort out an admin and information and technology issues

The organisation did really well in training me up and making the internship as useful to me as possible. At the end of the internship we had the opportunity to join the linkedin and facebook group which allowed us to connect with other CRUK intern alumni and stay updated about future roles going on in the organisation. Again there are plenty of workshops and even a mentoring scheme in place to help you with future interviews as well as to network at CRUK.

Future employment prospects at Cancer Research UK are great with many opportunities to work in different parts of the charity and they really try to promote from within their own pool of talent so doing the internship is a great bonus during the interview process. However due to it being a charity pay is not always the best but this is offset with the great team at hand.

Yes had thirsty Thursdays, group events, fundraising events set up by interns

Very high since it is London and you get paid lunch and travel expenses

Very good, a lot of bars around and we get discounts at some of these places

Yes, sports clubs, volunteering events etc.