Internal Audit Summer Intern Review

I really enjoyed my placement on the whole and felt it was a very valuable experience. It was a great chance to gain exposure to the working environment at RBS. Though there were inevitably minor things that I would change, overall my ten weeks were well spent and I really feel like I have developed my skills and grown my network.

I felt well respected by others in the workplace and felt like the work I completed was acknowledged and appreciated. I didn’t have a lot of audit work to complete at times but I felt that this was more a reflection of unfortunate timing rather than not being valued enough to be assigned this work.

I felt like I was given plenty guidance and felt comfortable asking for more if required. I felt like not only my manager, but the whole team were supportive and approachable for guidance if and when I needed it. I was given lots of opportunities to ask for additional support from my manager, although I did not often feel like I needed anything that was not already provided.

This varied quite a lot. In the first week I was kept very busy with admin and new joiner tasks. The second and third weeks went by quite slowly with not a lot to do at times although this was largely due to waiting for authorisations for systems access I needed to complete work. In my fourth week I was then very busy and a little overwhelmed by this big change as all work came at once. For the remainder of the internship, the workload has stabilised to generally a good balance, although there are still short infrequent spells when I am either without a task to complete or having too much to fit in.

I was given lots of tasks to complete however lots of these were administration tasks rather than audit specific work. I would have liked to get to work on some more audit file testing but this was restricted by the status of audits already ongoing. I was not given a large amount of responsibility but I actually felt like this was a positive as I got the chance to handle smaller responsibilities and develop my skills, starting to stretch me but not become overwhelming for someone very new to the industry and environment. I was happy with the level of responsibility given.

I felt that this experience was extremely valuable. It has developed my confidence and social skills within a work environment. I have learnt a lot about function specific things as well as a lot about the corporate environment in general. It has been really good practice networking and adjusting to the 9-5 working life. It has been a good chance to work with others on collaborative project and deal with some of the difficulties that would likely be encountered often in the workplace.

The atmosphere was generally good. Within my cluster, everyone was very friendly and approachable and regularly checked up to see how I was getting on/how I was enjoying the internship. I did feel that the links to other clusters were not as strong as I would have liked. The graduates in other teams were very engaging but other than that, I didn't get much exposure to the rest of the internal audit team unless I specifically sought out individuals when working on project work.

The placement was well structured and pre-joiner information was well defined and circulated. However, I feel like when I arrived within my department, it would have been good if more work had been lined up ready for me so that I would hit the ground running rather than waiting until week 3 or 4 to get more serious work assigned. The intern project was not well planned in my opinion as interns in all other departments started their projects in week 1 or 2 but we didn't receive all the necessary resources until much later, leaving unless only about 10 days to work on the main elements of the project. Whilst I appreciate there were other factors which contributed to this delay, it was quite frustrating when I was keen to get on with the project and make the most of it.

I had to complete GPL modules as part of my training. I attended a presentation skills webinar which helped to develop my skills. I was given the opportunity each week to flag development needs in my learning log submissions but I didn't find there was much to call out based on the time I was here for, and what had already been made available.

I would really like to work within the organisation in the future and am hopeful to receive an employment offer. The graduate scheme looks to be a valuable experience with the potential to gain a professional qualification and good prospects for promotion. The flexible working and great working environment makes this a really appealing place to work.

There were a few departmental events organised by the social committee and I got involved with some of the committee meetings whilst on placement. This included a barbeque and a show at The Edinburgh Fringe however, attendance was sometimes quite poor. There was a graduate/intern social event organised for us and also a social following a charity day we took part in. There were lots of events organised by interns out with work. The internship was fortunately aligned to the time of Edinburgh Fringe and this allowed plenty opportunity to socialise. It would have been nice to have a social within my cluster.

The cost of living was fairly reasonable and expected. The cost of eating out/drinking in the city was quite high especially in the city centre, but to be expected in such a city. Transport cost were also fairly standard for a city. The cost of accommodation was quite high in my opinion.

The nightlife in the city centre in Edinburgh was good. I don't particularly enjoy clubs but there were lots of nice restaurants, pubs and bars which I enjoyed visiting. The Edinburgh Fringe was a great chance to go out and enjoy comedy, music and variety performances both in venues and in the streets.

There is so much to do in Edinburgh and there were lots of gatherings though these were mostly organised informally by the interns out with work. There were a few discounted cinema screenings for employees which lots of my peers attended. I got involved in some charity work through the job and we were allowed some time out of office to pursue this.