This is a guest post from Dania Qureshi who is studying BSc Accounting and Finance (Year in Business) and undertaking a finance placement at the NPL in London. Dania showed real resilience in securing this placement – her initial placement offer from another company was retracted when the intern programme was cancelled due to Covid, but she did not give up, and persisted to secure herself another placement offer.
As the UK's National Measurement Institute, NPL
develops and maintains the national primary measurement
standards. From new antibiotics to tackle resistance and more effective
cancer treatments to unhackable quantum communications and superfast 5G, technological
advances must be built on a foundation of reliable measurement to succeed.
My placement is
centred around Financial Planning and Analysis, which means that I help my team
with creating various weekly and monthly reports, which are useful for NPL’s
budgeting and forecasting processes. As well as this, I am responsible for
creating and carrying forward different financial models, which go towards
analysing growth at a department/project level. Currently, I’m halfway through
my 15-month placement, and I can honestly say I did not expect to be given this
much responsibility!
The application process for NPL was all virtual as I applied
in June where Covid-19 meant we were all in lockdown. I thought it would be
challenging to work from home, as I wouldn’t know anyone, but it’s been a great
experience because my team are so attentive, and we have regular catch-up
sessions over Teams. My team and I even met up in Bushy Park for Ice cream when
I first started which was really nice (we were socially distanced of course)
I’m really glad I
decided to continue applying for Placements despite not being very lucky in the
beginning. As I applied to more, my CV and cover letter writing technique
improved massively and I became more confident when speaking during interviews.
I regularly made use of the fantastic careers advice team who helped me with my
competencies, and I also frequently called Karen and Katharine from the YIB
team who helped motivate me and gave me so much useful advice! This placement
has not only given me the technical skills I will need to work in Finance in
the future, but also improved soft skills such as time management,
communication, and teamwork.
To finish off this blog entry, I’d like to give you a few
tips for the application process. Make sure your competencies cover the core
values of the company e.g. If a value is ‘cooperation’ the interviewer may ask
you to describe a time where you worked well in a team.
- Make sure you ask someone from the careers
service to look over your competencies and give you advice! This one really
helped me. - Look out for the Placement Bulletin that is sent
out as that’s how I knew to apply to this placement! - Look over your CV (every point) before
interviews, as they will most likely target experiences and have you elaborate
on them - Don’t worry/give up if you haven’t got a
Placement yet, I got mine at the end of June and began in July! - Relax! I know it’s way easier said than done,
but think of your interview as a chat rather than an interrogation. Don’t be
pressured to lie or exaggerate experiences to sound more professional. E.g.
when I was interviewed for NPL, I got asked what my favourite book was and
instead of saying the Financial Times or anything I wouldn’t know about, I just
said Harry Potter 😊
