Operational conduct and control Review

The work, when available, was enjoyable and I think I was placed in an area that does suit my interests and skills. Unfortunately there wasn't a whole lot to do and I felt immensely frustrated at times as it did feel as though I was wasting my time doing next to nothing or extremely low level work. On arrival there was no sense that what I would be doing had been organised beforehand or even really thought about at all. The nature of the work my team engage in does mean it's difficult to get involved on a short term placement (10 weeks) but surely this should have been obvious when applying for an intern.

I got on well with my colleagues and they were very welcoming in a personal capacity, but when asking for work or even getting to know the business on arrival I felt as though I was wasting people's time. Because I wasn't given any really meaningful work either it didn't feel as though I was able to show my skillset to be considered a valuable member of the team.

My start was delayed for week (for reasons unknown to me) and on arrival my line manager was away for just over 2 weeks. I was assigned a 'day to day' manager to manage my daily work and it wasn't until the end of my first week when we met. My line manager was based in a different office in a different city (Glasgow whilst I was in Edinburgh) I didn't meet my line manager face to face until the end of my forth week; this being the only meeting we actually had. Other than that I saw her one other time at a team meeting held in Edinburgh. Because it took me so long to meet her, and because there was always the promise of more work on the horizon I felt it premature to complain until after I had met her, and when this did take place and no more work materialised, the referral process was already under way. There was never a point where anyone actually sat me down and really went over what it was we do and I ended up doing very little in my day to day manager's area, instead sitting with the other unit within our team who tried to find me work.

I either had next to nothing to do, or I would be given tasks that were quite frankly not of a level I would expect an intern (who are rated at a band D coming in) would be expected to complete, such as data entry into spreadsheets (with no accompanying analysis etc) as the only task available for sometimes days. Towards the end I managed to secure a project of sorts where I was then expected to complete the work at an unreasonably fast, purely because of the volume of reading required around it making it long rather than time spent analysing or disseminating data.

At times it felt as though the most useful thing I could do was get hot water or coffee for everyone. There were a couple of tasks I was given that did have a real impact on the business area but the actual work involved (proof reading or reading complaints) was so incredibly low level that it didn't really feel like I was helping all that much.

There was nothing I did in my time here that I have no already done in other jobs, volunteering, or general life. Again mainly because of the nature of the work I was given, I am already proficient at using programmes such as excel so entering figures or updating formulas didn't really develop my skills. To be honest this was my biggest gripe with my position, that I had wasted the most important summer (between last and penultimate year) in terms on interning on a position that gained me very little. Because of this I'm also not confident that I'll have been able to show enough of my skills to the team responsible for graduate progression to secure a place on the grad scheme - but time will tell.

The team were very nice, and the experience was good in that it was a much larger office size than I had worked in before and it showed me what that sort of environment is like.

Awful. I can't comment on the organisation of the team itself but for myself there was obviously no thought put into what my role would be before I arrived and when I meant my line manager it seemed as though she didn't understand what the point of the internship was, suggesting that networking was the main reason I was here. Furthermore as I already mentioned two days before I was due to start I was informed that I would have to delay a week because I wouldn't have access to the business. I didn't have log on details for my first two days or an email address for the first three as this obviously hadn't been done in a timely fashion before I started. I imagine this is also why my start was delayed as the process for getting me access/set up hadn't been started.

Not a great deal on my placement, but I have been involved in other development programmes with the business prior to my internship so I feel it would be unfair to say that they did nothing. On my actual placement though there was very little time invested into me by my team/managers.

I can see that there are great opportunities within the business in general and it is obviously a huge employer, I was in a very small team that I wouldn't be adverse to working in as they do good work, just didn't manage having an intern well at all.

Yes especially for those sharing accommodation there was many opportunities to make friends. I live in rented accommodation as I'm in the same city as university and have friends here already so I'm not sure how suitably I could answer this question however.

Edinburgh is fairly expensive, though nothing like London, but there are multiple locations and I wanted to be here so that cannot be blamed on the business. The available accommodation was in a reasonable area too with good access to shops and places to go out that aren't too pricey.

Not bad, but again I already live here throughout the year so I am used to this city. This also isn't particularly a concern to me as part of the internship and I care far more about the work available.

Personally I can get involved in a lot as I live here already. Activities with colleagues outside of work did not take place but this isn't something I was particularly on the look out for. There are plenty of volunteering activities that Lloyds get involved in though and theses are a great way to do stuff outside of work.