Experience gained in a real business environment aids decision making
The Citi global transaction services internship offers exceptional exposure to the company and training that is highly customised to interns needs.
'We want to expand individuals' horizons, and also give them the tools necessary to make decisions about what they do in the rest of their career,' said Lisa Somerville, director of human resources for Citi global transaction services in Asia-Pacific.
The two-month internship takes about 12 students from the MBA programme at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. While centred in global transaction services offering solutions such as risk management, interns get to experience other departments.
'That's one of the differentiating things about this programme. In most internship programmes, you typically work only in the group where you've been hired.'
Somerville said that interns also had extensive contact with people from senior management. They work alongside their managers each day and are mentored by them.
Anthony Cheng, who took the internship this summer and is now a global transaction services analyst, said he worked with the regional head of trade services to help analyse the profitability of his business, looking at data for different products and customer bases. 'I was working side by side with the managing director,' Cheng said. 'It gave me great training. He assisted me along the way and when I needed guidance or had questions, he would help me.'
Somerville said the internship also offered training tailor-made for MBA students. So while interns get the more usual product service training, they also get talks from senior mangers to build their wider understanding and coaching in presentation skills.
'The head of Hong Kong's global transaction service sales team held a workshop on how to give effective presentations,' Cheng said. 'I found that very useful.'
He said the interns were also asked to give their own presentations and were given extensive feedback. For him, these opportunities to apply the skills in a real business environment and among senior professionals were the main way the internship added value to his studies. 'Presenting in front of your classmates is very different to presenting in front of the Asia-Pacific head of global transaction services,' he said. 'It builds your confidence and solidifies what you learned. While you do learn a lot in the MBA, it's very theoretical.'
Somerville said while interns were given real responsibilities, they were also closely guided in carrying out these roles. They receive constant feedback from mentors and other staff to help them develop.
She said this kind of supervised development meant it wasn't necessary to have any specific technical skills when applying for the programme.
'We don't expect the students to come in with any previous knowledge of global transaction services,' she said. 'We expect them just to be dedicated and interested in the programme. If they have that desire, we can provide the specific product skills.'
Cheng said the internship was suited to somebody who had a passion for the financial industry and wanted to take on new roles and responsibilities. 'Once you're able to deliver, people see that and you're rewarded with more duties,' he said.
The programme was meant to provide exposure to GTS, and other parts of Citi while providing transferable skills that the students could leverage in their professional and personal pursuits, Somerville said. She added that the bank was also seeking to identify talented individuals to move into its graduate training scheme.
