CFAB: End of internship!

It's finally the end of my internship!!! Such a short, yet long internship (totally depend on my mood and the engagement I was assigned to). So, I am going to write on my thoughts, as well as what I have gained from this internship as the last post for this year. 

Internship is definitely better than studying. Why? There is no stress on taking all the tests and exams (I hate exams the most), plus I don't have to study or continue to work after working hour (that's my policy - no work after work). The only stressful thing that I faced was when I didn't understand a certain thing or couldn't do a certain thing and I dwelled on it, even after work. -.-. So yeah, work did continue to haunt me after working hour, even during my precious sleeping hour. T.T. However, I gained the satisfaction after being able to solve a problem by myself. =D

Troublesome things would be something like travelling to work. Travelling from my house to the office back and fro, is definitely tiring, troublesome and expensive, unless I am working in client place that is near my house or the client has late office hour. So, one advice, distance from house to work is definitely a must to consider, unless you don't mind the traffic during peak hour and waking up early.

Something do remain the same though. For example, I still fell asleep during work as in when I was studying. Yes, I know I'm not supposed to. But, my eyelids were so heavy and that if I didn't take a tiny nap, I had no idea what I was doing and would have just wasting my time flipping the documents with a blank mind. 

There were certainly something fun and enjoyable. My company, or should I say my team I worked with, has a monthly outing, in which the higher-ups (partner, principal,...) will chip in for all the team members to have fun and relaxing time after the long, stressful working hour. For the 3 months, I went for 2 of them. One was dinner in TGI Friday's and the other was having a relaxing spa in Lavish Spa, which I will be blogging next year. These monthly outings, I heard, are organised after I joined this company. So, I guess I am pretty lucky to be able to join in the fun. Also, for people like me, who joined internship at the end of the year, I was invited to their annual dinner too. So, there were lots of "gaining fats" during this period of internship. 

I was pretty lucky in this internship too. This is because I got to go for outstation for more than a week to Penang for an on field engagement! This, I heard, is a rare chance for interns. So, I guess I should be proud of it? One benefit of entering a medium-sized firm!

An interesting thing of being an auditor, I am supposed most people pretty know much about it, would be working in different places! This is definitely one attractive point of being an auditor as I get to change my working environment constantly and get to meet lots of people. This kept me from getting bored. Another pros of working in medium-sized firms (large firms have to stay in an engagement for quite long, may be a few months)!

From this internship, I gained many new things, such as stocktaking, vouching, stat auditing, preparing working papers, etc., which motivated me throughout this internship. Also, I was exposed to different fields of finance department. I learnt how they keep their documents, how they work as a team in finance, heard their working life and etc, and these would definitely benefit me in the future. Also, I was taught to behave in a workplace, such as what to talk and what not to talk from my seniors, in order to not involve in workplace politics. 

Finally, this, I am sure, is what prospective CFAB-ers would like to know. That would be, "Is the knowledge I learnt able to apply into workplace? Will it be sufficient?" For the first question, a definite yes, and the knowledge you learnt will make your life easier. For the second question, knowledge will never be sufficient. Humans need to be constantly learning and changing to improve, and therefore these lead to different kind of situations in the audit field. The knowledge you gained during CFAB will give you a strong foundation to help you face these changing situations. 

Today marks the end of my internship and the end of the year. Starting from tomorrow begins a new chapter of my life. And so, I wished everyone all the best and stay happy and safe. Happy counting down and happy new year !!