Account Manager Support Review

I enjoyed my internship to a large extent. The colleagues are very welcoming, friendly and make each day at work enjoyable. Besides from being relevant to my studies and helping me to progress, I also enjoyed the tasks I was given and took an interest in each one to a full extent.

The colleagues made me feel very valued. We often had meetings on a weekly basis where we would all discuss issues for the upcoming week and have general office chat, and I could approach any of them with problems that I encountered during my internship which made me feel comfortable.

I was given support not only by the branch manager but also the complete team of colleagues in the branch. I quickly learnt that at Handelsbanken, all staff are treated equally and it's a collective group effort to help each other which was useful for me starting a new internship.

My typical day was 'busy enough' but not so much that I started getting stressed or having to rush tasks. The manager would often catch up with me to ask how I was getting on, if I needed any more work and we would assess from there which tasks to give me.

I felt like I was thrown straight into the mix of things when I joined the internship, as I had been told on the training days. Throughout the internship, I have visited clients on meetings and been responsible for drawing up important documentation that holds a lot of responsibility. However, there are certain areas that legally I am not able to do due to qualifications/experience levels.

This internship has massively benefited my studies as I can put the classroom knowledge into practice in the form of mortgages, loans, overdrafts, various computer systems to assess/produce documents and the tangible things that we are not always able to get a chance to do at university. It also gave me an insight into whether I would like to work in the banking industry.

The atmosphere in the office was a mixture of enjoyable but also professional when needed to be. As the majority of the week involved busy schedules for all staff, there were times when colleagues were busy at their desks but also times such as lunch break and less busy periods when we would have good conversations and have a laugh.

The internship was well organised but on the other hand, it wasn't completely rigid because branch likes to operate slightly differently and trust colleagues to work responsibly in their own fashion. Therefore, I was given general guidance as to what I should be doing but also the flexibility to ask questions if I would prefer to be doing something else.

As this was only an 8 week internship, we didn't have the time to be investing large amounts of training into myself as I wanted to make the most of each day in the branch. With that being said, I am confident that over a longer placement the bank would provide me with the necessary investments to help advance my career.

Based on the experience I've had here, I would be more than happy to apply for future job prospects in the bank. After graduation from university, it is more than likely that I will be enquiring back to Handelsbanken for any vacancies and this is based on the learning experience and enjoyment that I received on the internship.

Each intern was based on their own in a different branch so we didn't get a lot of social interaction time with each other. However, we were given a group project throughout our 8 weeks which required multiple meetings and a presentation, and we would socialise with each other during this time.

Already living close to the area, the only costs I incurred was a bus pass for the 8 weeks and basic food/drink expenses. The branch was on the outskirts of Manchester so typically has far cheaper prices than in the city. The few places I visited during my time here were very reasonable.

I didn't experience any nightlife during my time here.

The main opportunities that have been presented to me was the staff night out and Christmas party later in the year. I didn't fully explore other opportunities that are available due to the busy schedule of working days but I have been told that Handelsbanken provide many opportunities for staff who want them.