Barclays Spring INtern Review

The insight was made out of four parts: Skills Session, Markets Insight Banking Insight and finally the Assesment center. The skills session is the most entertaining one, as it's given by a professional rhetoric's trainer. Teamworking exercises, Personality test, speech-giving and feedback are a wonderful chance to get to get to network with fellow interns. Markets Insight involves a trading game simulation that emulates the time pressure and the quick decisions done in a team. Baking is less enjoyable, involving long presentations from Analysts and a quite technical description of economic models. Assesment center is very stressful and competitive, with fellow interns being less friendly than during the previous sessions.

Three factors made me feel valued in Barclays: Firstly, the HR team was always present to guide us through the jam-packed schedule, motivating us to ask questions. Secondly, every employee we met on presentations, simulations and networking sessions took time to honestly give us their view of working at Barclays, no matter the seniority. Lastly, the length of the assessment center and work shadowing that was on the cost of the employees there showed dedication to the quality of the programme.

Prior to the internship, I have received guidance from a Barclays Budde - a fellow employee of the bank who also did the internship many years ago. Furthermore, each lunch is in itself an informal networking event, where Analysts would just come over and talk to us. During work shadowing, we had plenty of opportunities to ask for personal guidance.

I developed networking skills that don't simply rely on prepared questions but learned to go with genuine curiosity. I however also realized my own limits regarding the number of people I communicate within a day and how it withers away my personal connection to each and every one of them.

The insight was structured well during the week, there were, however, two problems. Firstly, the insight programme was very tightly packed, with breaks being very infrequent and short, which hindered getting to know some of the interns in the programme. Secondly, the schedules were not sent out beforehand, making the tight programme quite unexpected for those who wanted to take time to prepare for the assessment center.

The atmosphere was very competitive, with people trying to get the few spots and fighting for speaking time when asking questions. This was especially apparent when senior members of the Industry came to speak or at the networking events where there was a high intern/employee ratio. This was heightened during the last day of the assessment center, where two teams are pitted against each other in a debate.

Barclays invested in me three ways: They invested alot of their financial resources in form of compensation for the week, quality accommodation and travel expenses. Secondly, they invested into a private company for the skills training session, which was very high quality. Lastly, they invested a lot of their employees time from their work to shadow us or to give us presentations.

On one hand, I got to know the trading floor and the work environment in Barclays, understand the work ethic and the daily schedule. On the other hand, regarding the actual nature of the work, the simulations were either overly simplified and hence didn't capture the essence of the job or overly technical, preventing an honest understanding of a full-time role in a firm. A balance of the simulations would have been good.

Because each employee talked about the company culture, it was a frequent topic of discussion. One important insight was how the company culture varies across subdivisions within one department, how even in Investment Banking, DCM and ECM teams have a different approach to work than M&A teams.

There were three ways it helped me: Firstly, it gave me a reason to read the financial news in order to discuss them with the employees there, making me more interested in the industry. Secondly, I understood the advantages of the industry: stable job entry and predefined advancement in a fast-paced sector. Lastly, I understood the severe requirements of this career path: long working hours, team-oriented work and a steep learning curve as an analyst.

I was paid for my International Travel expenses, accommodation and expenses. I wasn't paid for local travel in London. Important to note that the payment an reimbursement goes through the Barclays Back office, not the HR, and hence can take months to process due to the high volume of work.

Each lunch was a networking opportunity with the analysts, where HR provided each of the analysts a brief introduction to get the conversation going. There were networking events with drinks and canapes with senior bankers in a company, Each speaker mingled around for some time after their presentation so you could come and ask them questions.

They had a large variety, some of them, especially with senior members were meticulously planned out and included a short speech whichwas the ongoing topic of discussion. Others were spontanious and informal, a chance to ask more personal questions, joke around and get to know the intimate parts of Barclays that nobody talks about publicly.

Minimally because the work life balance within the industry is very imbalanced. Outside of work, many employees simply work more and it is impossible to get involved into anything of your own. The only good thing is to get to know the small variations across subdivisions and the working hours there. But generally, employess don't seem to do much beside work.

I would recommend it because it offers a good assessment center with high chances of getting a summer internship, with good prospects for a graduate scheme. I would not recommend it if you want to get to know the departments in detail, as the whole internship covered a vast variety of divisions and breadth over depth was preferred.