Summer intern Review

I found the work was really tailored to my degree and this allowed me to really enjoy what I was doing. Furthermore, I got to meet with loads of great people which really helped me enjoy my time here. Finally, there were lots of facilities like a gym that provided a break from work.

I definitely felt valued by my colleagues. In particular, both my line manager and my mentor were a great help (not only on work related matters but also other things). Furthermore, we often went out to places e.g. to the pub, which helped being more at ease with my colleagues.

My line manager was really great and she helped me throughout the internship. At the beginning of the internship we discussed potential objectives together and mutually agreed on a set of 8 objectives to accomplish over my time at the Bank. During my time here we constantly reviewed these objectives to help me meet them.

It really depends. Some days were more relaxed and I could get on with my project in my own way, which was really useful as this allowed me to pursue different aspects of the project that I wouldn't have been able to otherwise. Other days were much more busy, however never too busy that I felt overwhelmed.

I was given a huge amount of responsibility as I could take my project in whatever direction I wanted. This autonomy allowed me to explore areas such as machine learning as well as go to regular seminars (such as going to a seminar on Brexit and the EU) and go on work shadowing in other divisions.

The thing that has been the most useful is learning about what I wanted to after university (and whether the Bank and more widely finance was right for me). I also learnt R the programming language, which will definitely be useful in my degree, as well as how to manage my time and set objectives.

In general the atmosphere was very relaxed and not what you would expect working in a bank (we also went out to the pub!). One thing that was really good in my division was that you could come to work in (nearly) whatever you wanted to wear, be that a suit or jeans and trainers.

The internship was extremely well organised and I always had something to do. In particular the structure was great with the first stage being settling in and learning about the bank on the first week and then researching my project in the following weeks. In the last few weeks I then prepared to present my finds.

Working at the Bank of England you really get a feeling that the Bank wants you to succeed and they will help you. In particular, one day I had the entire day off in order to do a training session on presentation skills and public speaking, something I found really useful.

I lived in London which was very expensive (of course). Luckily, I had people that I could stay with during my internship which saved me a lot of money on both rent and food. However, travel is still very expensive (around £100 per month to get a tube pass) but the food at the Bank is subsidised which saved a lot of money.