Friday Intern Activities
Friday’s, unlike the others, are spent at the San Francisco office, where the internship program provides intern-specific events, from boat rides and baseball games to cooking classes.
“So Mondays through Thursdays are all on the client’s site, and more often than not there’s no other intern on your project. Then on Friday, while we still don’t do work with the other interns, there are social events, so we can get to know one another and try to make friends,” Leung says. “By meeting each other and building relationships, we can network.”
Every other Friday, Deloitte provides interns with networking events – opportunities to get to know the firm and people higher up in the firm.
“We went to a baseball game, but first we went to happy hour somewhere really close to AT&T Park. We just kind of talked to the people higher up at Deloitte to see what the firm is like and what their lifestyles are like. Seeing who the people are in the firm is just kind of cool, and after that we watched the baseball game together,” Leung says.
On Fridays without events, Leung grabs lunch with her on-boarding advisor. “We just talk about life and about things in the firm – how things are going. He’s really cool,” she says. She also has a counselor who helps keep her on track with her internship and helps her make connections within the firm. “He’s guiding me through the internship, making sure I’m keeping on track and making sure that I’m still comfortable. He can also use his connections to introduce me to people that I’d like to talk to.”
Consulting Intern Conference
Though Leung’s weeks seem scheduled to the brim, she took some time away from the typical routine last week and attended a conference at Deloitte University (DU) last week. DU is a facility that Deloitte uses for learning purposes, and the conference was for all the Deloitte consulting interns across the United States. For three days they networked, listened to speakers, and participated in a Business Chemistry learning experience.
The Business Chemistry Test, which they all took, is similar to the Myers-Briggs test, according to Leung. It puts people into specific categories, based on their work and communication styles, and is designed to help them understand what those styles are and help them figure out the best way to work with people who may have different styles. Leung cited entrepreneurial types who don’t like set schedules as people who may clash in office settings with types who like to set and fulfill goals.
“After we learned about our own business chemistry, we had a learning session for about six hours on a case simulation, and we put different people into groups to see how we worked together, using our strengths and weaknesses. It was useful to see those strengths and weaknesses played out.”
Speakers included Deloitte’s Chief Talent Officer, who spoke about her experience at the firm, as well as other partners, managers, directors, and even a paralympian swimmer. The interns networked amongst themselves, attended a game night with karaoke, on-site cartoonists, and a life-sized Jenga, among other things, and also participated in community service events before leaving. “It was a lot of no sleep,” Leung says. “But it was pretty fun.”
As for her Future Plans:
After she completed her first internship at Deloitte, Leung felt like people saw her differently – as more of a leader and certainly as more experienced. “Just having that name, and being associated with the Deloitte brand opened up new opportunities,” she says. “It’s the one thing other employers always ask me about, and I feel like it will influence me for the rest of my career.”
Though she doesn’t know what she wants to spend the rest of her life doing, she knows that she wants to start with Deloitte. “There are so many different service lines and so many different industries that Deloitte goes into. A lot of people ask me what I want to do in the long run, and I always tell them that right after school, I want to join Deloitte.”
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