Strategy Analyst intern Review

I found the work very engaging and interesting, I was doing real business work in an area of my own to become an expert on. There was a very good level of support given to me along with lots of feedback to be able to improve on. There was a lot of emphasis on socializing opportunity with other interns, and a really great effort by the intern program team to give me support so I was able to get the most out of the internship.

My work did really seem to be valued by people, and people really seemed to care about the input I gave and listened to my ideas. People were more than happy to help at any point and were interested in what and why I was doing what I was doing. The work I did was valued and will be used going forward, and people really cared about my views on the piece of work, not just the output I produced.

I was given more guidance at first and had things suggested for me to do and then as time went on I was trusted more to follow my ideas, and work on things I thought were most useful. I was given lots of support when I needed things clearing up or help, from anybody who I asked. I was given daily time with my manager to chat about my ideas and get feedback and guidance on what to do going forward.

I had enough to do to never be bored and waiting about, but also not given so much that I had to work late or could not keep up with the work. I mostly was working independently on my own project and so could work to my own goals and timeline to a large extent, this meant I was able to keep my self busy and so efficient but equally not rushed. I was not working late however, and still could have a full lunch break.

The area I was working on was only looked at by me and the decisions going forward will be based on my work, and not redone/ checked and so in this sense I was responsible for the area, but equally there was still no potential for me to make a wrong decision that would be bad. I was trusted to follow what I thought was useful and not instructed or told what to do and so was responsible for what I was doing in the day

I was given lots of soft skills training on areas like self management or teamwork which will have direct impact on my further studies and beyond and also the collaborative working style will be very useful going forward. The hard skills I developed that were job specific will be most useful in future jobs, rather than in my studies however they were quite wide skills which will be relevant in most roles in the similar field.

It is a very exciting and vibrant environment, people are light hearted and fun and not overly serious. people are very happy to help each other and share what they can with other people, there is not and competition between people, they take the view of succeeding together. there is lots of opportunity for breaks and fun in the work day and time for non work related chats, the view is work hard play hard.

it is very clear that the team have put a lot of thought and effort in to planning the internship and the events and structure, they regularly ask for feedback and actively took it on board as the internship went on. they dealt with any problems very quickly and understandingly. there was a very good structure and support scheme in place from before the internship started and a good level of structure change as time goes on.

they did several soft skills training sessions with an external company a long with giving exposure to the senior leadership and getting to hear from them and get their advice, also they gave many sessions on job specific skills and the business in general, no prior knowledge is expected and the training makes up for this. there is a constant focus on development and my goals for the future weather they are at capital one or not

I think the graduate scheme seems very appealing, and similar to the quality of the internship

I think it was worse for being work from home but there was a lot of effort to try make up for this, lots of effort was put in to try make up for the work from home nature of the internship and all of the other interns and associates put in an effort to socials and so it worked well. I think that it was very good considering it was work from home (due to covid).

the office in in central London by shoreditch so it is an expensive part of the country, although it is not too bad for london and is cheaper than the city

Shoreditch has a very good night life

there are a lot of opportunities for getting involved, far more than one person could ever reasonably do, these range from the business resource groups which give chance to get involved with social issues and networking, and then also outreach to help run sessions for school children. there are also lots more opportunities if it was not work from home due to covid, including a summer festival or a wine tasting and also other social events in person