Data Analyst Review

I had a great time working at the Bank of England, the work life balance provided is one of a kind, colleagues are very supportive, there are countless opportunities to learn and improve yours skills. The Bank is also a big host of international fora and often invites well-known speakers to debate on current issues, this kind of insight is unique!

My team was really nice. We lots of socials like pubs, sports days and treasure hunts. We encourage discussion and people are always happy to teach and share their knowledge. I would often be asked to help out in analytical work, this was good for my skills and it gave me the chance to try different types of work.

Management does a good job at nurturing progress, providing feedback and ensuring staff are delivering on their objectives. Managers often have weekly catch ups with their reports and that enables open communication which is key for people to understand where they have to improve. Guidance in document form is equally widely available.

Quite busy, and the flow of work really comes in waves. Management is very supportive in staff prioritising tasks deemed more important when work piles up, but it there is room for improvement smoothing out that flow. Managers' support is key here and I always felt I could have a frank conversation with my manager when I need to prioritise some tasks over others.

At the start of the placement I was allocated many administrative task which I owned throughout the year. Understandably placement students get allocated such tasks because of their lack of specialist knowledge required to perform more important roles. I believe this is where a big room for improvement is as allocating admin tasks to IP can often undermine the learning objectives of the placement. This meant that at the start I was overloaded with uninteresting tasks which impeded me to do more interesting work. After a few months in the job I had talks with my manager as I was not happy with this and we made big changes. I was then able to hold much more responsibility on key business activities.

To a great extent!! The Bank is a great place to learn and even admin tasks can take you a long way in learning. There is plenty of time dedicated to training and great quality courses provided by industry professionals are available free of charge. Managers are open to allocate reports' time to training and a lot of focus is put on improving skills.

The atmosphere in the office was very good, there was a great effort from management to balance workload and that was reflected in people's openness to help and share because they had the time to do so. There are many social events planned on a department level, many of which take place in the office.

Well organised. The central early careers team does a great job at making the on-boarding process as smooth as possible and are always available to assist industrial placement students and all other work placement staff. Local areas have different on-boarding processes and I have seen mixed feedback. In my case it was not very difficult, although it can be quite a steep learning curve during the first few weeks.

I was offered several opportunities to participate in training sessions which are fully paid by the Bank. Training sessions held by Bank employees and industry professionals are available, so the options are very broad. Given that adequate planning happens between your manager and yourself there should be no problems in getting training.

Very appealing! The Bank does a great job at informing Industrial Placement students of their prospects in building a career in the institution. Towards the end of the placement the Early Careers Team hold session to explain how IP students can convert their placements into graduate roles and there is plenty of information available in documents too.

There were regular socials or meet ups for drinks after work most Fridays. We also used to meet up for lunch regularly, so it was quite nice as it built up a community amongst us. This was really important because most people on our teams are quite older or quite senior in comparison to us. It could be quite cliquey at times as Bath gets a lot of placement students here.

I lived in London already so I had a lot of free cash (which I chose to save for a car). So I didn’t socialise very much, but there were lots of opportunities for drinks. I personally prefer lunches as I feel like there is a better chance to learn about my colleagues. It wasn't too expensive but I have definitely seen cheaper.

The nightlife was okay, as the average age of people working in the City isn't 21 the events are ofen ping pong, foose ball or bars or eating out. However, this is not a bad thing because it means afterwards you aren't totally smashed and can make it in to work for the next day. I think that there is a lot of choice of pubs if drinking is your activity but not extreme choice of anything else.

There are a range of clubs and societies to join. I joined Christian union, the BAME society (BEEM) and there are lots of team initiatives like wellbeing champion or diversity champion or green champion. This is a chance to get a responsibility outside of your role that you can organise activities/ competitions to raise awareness for your relevant championship.