Actuarial Intern Review

The internship provided a great insight into the Actuarial profession, in particular the UK Retirement division. Despite the restrictions of Covid-19, the 4 week virtual internship was packed with interesting work and projects which gave a great flavour of what a graduate role would be like. I throughly enjoyed meeting interns across the UK as well as network with professionals in the industry which was helpful when making and delivering presentations. It was an extremely welcoming environment which added to the experience.

All my colleagues and fellow interns were extremely friendly and always willing to help. Given the virtual environment, the ability to contact colleagues via teams straight away was very helpful for an intern starting out. From the lower levels to senior management, everyone was approachable and willing to answer any questions I had that was work related. Moreover, my buddies were instrumental in giving me interesting work and always checked up on my progress as well as reviewed work.

I was given a lot of support and guidance from everyone I interacted with. In particular, my line manager scheduled weekly meetings where we discussed what work I was doing as well as going through the internship journal I was writing. Moreover, my two buddies were very supportive, especially getting used to the IT systems and Microsoft Teams. The central internship manager was also very helpful, especially constructing various opportunities to ask questions and review certain topics.

Throughout the four weeks, I was very lucky to always have interesting work or projects to be involved in. The internship on average was 9am to 5pm with an hour break for lunch. Between this period, I was busy, doing client work, working through the actuarial fundamentals workbook, networking with professionals from various divisions as well as work on the presentations which I was expected to deliver in the final week. The client work mostly involved calculations.

Considering I was only an intern for 4 weeks, the responsibility that I had was great. I was given my own email and calendar, which I had to manage myself and deal with Microsoft Teams calls and emails. I was also given client work from members in the team which were then reviewed and checked as is all client work. Furthermore, I was responsible for managing the time I spent on client work as well as working on my own personal development, working on various projects and soft skills.

The skills I developed over the internship are extremely transferable and have helped me in general life as well as studies. In particular, communicating in a clear and coherent manner and talking in a way that is suitable for your audience. Moreover, time management skills, which involved prioritising work and hitting deadlines is extremely transferable, especially in a university setting. Finally, working in a virtual environment, a new normal, is a skill that is increasingly more significant.

The atmosphere which I observed over Microsoft Teams was very welcoming as well as busy. The weekly team meetings which were split into business units were always interesting and informative of the week ahead. In addition, the social events which were also virtual, gave the interns a great opportunity to relax at the end of a week and meet colleagues in a more informal and relaxed environment. Overall, it was a strong and collegiate atmosphere.

Given the restrictions of Covid-19, I could not fault the effort that had gone in to make the internship possible. The internship was very well organised, with actuarial interns across all the offices being involved in the same programme. The opportunities we had to work between interns and meet experienced professionals was fantastic. The hard work that we had put throughout the internship paid off in the final week where we delivered our group and individual presentations.

As mentioned in the previous questions, there was a big emphasis on the interns with loads of fantastic training sessions throughout the internship on all the areas of pensions. These sessions were on a variety of interesting topics that increased our knowledge within the pensions industry as well as improved our softer skills. Finally, we were given an actuarial fundamentals workbook to work through, which gave us a flavour of the exam material as well as the work that a consultant would do.

The future employment prospects within the firm are great!

There was a great social scene during the internship, although it was slightly different! There were various social events that were organised virtually which were office specific as well as one big social event for all the retirement interns across the different office. These socials, which were focussed partly on team building through various games, was a great opportunity to meet different people within the firm in a relaxed environment. Given the pandemic, it was great to still have a social aspect to the internship.

N/A since virtual internship.

N/A since virtual internship.

Outside of work between 9am-5pm, there was a lot of opportunities for the interns to get involved with. For example, the interns which consisted of 5 people were tasked with organising a social event and also create a newsletter. These opportunities gave us a chance to get to know each other better and work together in a more relaxed setting. These activities were done outside of work and took place in the final week of the internship.