Internship at CIMB Investment Bank

Just over a month ago, I walked out the doors of CIMB Investment Bank with a sense accomplishment.

Like many university students, I was crazy enough to give up two months of my precious summer break to spend over 10 hours a day, five days a week, getting paid minimal salary to soak up the once in a lifetime experience to work with a team of dedicated investment bankers.

I never used to believe in internships, because I know that if you had a taste of what’s in stall for you when you graduate (LONG working hours, a social life the size of a pea, crazy morning traffic while having breakfast in the car…), you will NEVER go back to the job that you once idolized and work so hard to get into.

Don’t get me wrong, I liked finance, I just wasn’t sure we were meant to be. Hence the internship was supposed to tip my scale between accounts or finance, whichever it was going to be.

So on that faithful first week of December, my internship begun with CIMB. I will not bore you with details of my work, but for all you potential internship seekers, take solace in the fact that I did NOT spend everyday photocopying, making coffee/tea for superiors (they had tea ladies for a reason), running errands, and other miniscule administrative work.

In fact, there were days where I actually offered to do photocopying just to get away from my desk. In many ways I believe that the people you work with, especially your colleagues and your immediate bosses, were the ones that truly made the difference in your whole experience.

I was very fortunate to be put into a team of very accommodating and understanding people. At the risk of sounding like a complete bimbo, I would admit that there were times, the financial jargons and their expectation of our knowledge was so overwhelming that I had to annoy them with continuous questions that seem so simple and mindless. But even in their crazy and hectic schedules, they always had an encouraging tone and found time to go through, part by part, and explain every nook and cranny until it all made sense.

That annoying saying of “the best lessons are learnt outside class” haunted me everyday of work and now looking back, well, there wasn’t a part of my experience that could have proved that statement wrong.

To many, working in an internship was a wake up call. For the other intern working with me, she knew from that experience that she would never be able to survive an office job that required to be seated there the whole day. She actually worked at her desk standing up everyday.

I on the other hand, did not experience that slap of obviousness. I knew for sure that I didn’t want to go back to the hustle of the crazy morning traffic but there was something about that place that made it to the list of possible places I wanted to work when I graduate. And in case you were wondering, I never managed to decide between accounting and finance. I’m still working on it : )

Kind contribution by Ms Mabel Low who is currently pursuing a Bachelor in Commerce with a double Major of Acounting & Finance at the University of Queensland.