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Hey all! Jainam Doshi and Kriti Chaturvedi here. We are final year undergrads from the Department of Chemical Engineering, pursuing minors in Management. We recently completed our summer internship as summer associates in the Management Consulting profile at PwC US Advisory, where our competency was Health Transformation.
About PwC
PwC offers internships as a cluster of various forms of niche consulting.
1. HIA: Healthcare Consulting (Consulting in the healthcare sector)
2. Finance: Financial Consulting (Executing cost optimization for companies)
3. DDV: M&A Consulting
4. Operations: Supply Chain Consulting
The well-set internship structure followed is the same for all the divisions, with only the sector of the company/ project differing across different transformations. The idea is to treat us like full-time employees. Two types of tasks are assigned- building a model for the company or working on a live project. The working hours were quite dynamic, typical of consult, ranging from 4-7 hours a day, with the occasional odd-hour client call.
PwC is a company at par with the latest technology and the services they provide. You get a good flavour of corporate life while working in the office and interacting with the Senior associates. The structure was very flat at the office, and you could even freely approach the Director if something was troubling you. All the people we met while working on the projects and otherwise had unique backgrounds, but everyone had come to PwC after completing their MBA. Everyone had a different skill set and experience to share and learn from. Also, the best thing about having co-interns from your batch is that you learn together, and peer learning helped us clear a lot of our doubts.
Each intern is allotted a Buddy (an Associate), a Coach (a Senior associate assigned to be my Mentor), and a Relationship Leader (the Director) to oversee our journey throughout. In the first week itself, I connected with my buddy and coach. We got a lot of guidance from each one of them, and I could never have imagined that I would find and connect with people with so many similar interests as me. They would frequently check in and motivate us. They provided me with enough freedom to show my creativity and voice my opinions, while also correcting some of the mistakes that we were making.
The broad goals of PwC US Advisory are to provide Management Consulting Services to the Client that are "Above and Beyond" the scope of the ask. The projects we worked on reflected the same as we worked hard to provide what the Client wanted, be it formulating a strategy or doing research; the main focus was to aid the Client and make their engagement with us as effortless as possible.
Some of the benefits offered by the company were: a full-fledged welcome kit containing all the work essentials like Laptop, earbuds, mouse, bottle, and even a plant and a candle to keep at your work desk!
Timeline
The internship had unfortunately begun online, as a WFH due to COVID. Luckily, 2 weeks in, at the first sight of a mail, some of my co-interns and I had enough enthu to experience Corporate Life in person. For the second month I went to the PwC Acceleration Central Office in Bangalore. And trust me when I tell you it was a whole new experience. Interacting and connecting with people you work with in person is so much better than meeting them online, you not only make professional connections but you develop friendship with them. We all used to have lunch together, had 2-3 parties every week for refreshment, and interacted with the director of our team in an informal setting. The best thing about the firm was the people's culture where your colleagues care for you. We also had an event in which even the people working from home flew down to Bangalore to meet their colleagues. It felt like a true workation! Bangalore as a city is also a pretty beautiful place with its weather, forts, parks and lakes. But sometimes it also gets to you with its traffic and rain. I learnt about all the difficulties moving to a different city, from finding where to live to managing all my expenses – all while while exploring the city's culture.
In the first 2 weeks, the flow of information dissemination at both firm and department levels was something like – a common induction for all competencies explaining the general functioning of PwC (ethical regulations, proprietary data handling, etc), followed by training in the Healthcare Industry that we consulted, and the different softwares mandatory. After that, we worked on team or individual projects, each requiring a different skillset and a different learning outcome and impact.
While the projects were ongoing, there were some tools training sessions where we got the opportunity to learn Tableau, Alteryx, and Power Bi, which are frequently used by consultants. Apart from that, Kriti was also engaged in a social activity where she had to take sessions on topics like time management and interview skills for the beneficiaries of the NGOs as a way of giving back to society. The last week was mostly preparing for the final presentation.
Our Projects in Detail
Jainam Doshi: PwC provided a unique project to interns based on their skill sets. So, while I had a project related to Project and Strategy management, my co-interns had various projects related to Data Analytics, Automation and In-Depth Research. The first project that I worked on required me to work in a team to perform research on the Healthcare Industry. The second project was inclined toward project management and providing insights into a Client's software requirements. These 2 projects provided me with a lot of insights into the world of Consulting, and I was more than satisfied with the work that I had done.
Kriti Chaturvedi: I worked on 4 major projects during my tenure. Their problem statements are as follows:
Industry Analysis Project 1: Industry Overview of the Omics Industry
Automation Project 2: Automation of the Updation of the 90 Days Project Plan
Automation Project 3: Cost Report Automation and Validation for Strategic Reimbursement for a Healthcare Provider
Industry Analysis Project 4: Creating an IT Strategy Roadmap for a Healthcare Player
In the 2nd week, after the training was over, I was allotted the first 2 projects. It became really hectic for me from the offset, and I struggled to adjust to the pace and become as proactive as required. I realized that by dividing my time and energy, I was not achieving my full potential in either, and not working well with one of the teams. So, I had a chat about my interests and teamwork with my Coach, and then worked on my preference. He understood my concerns and found another project for me to start in the 5th week, around when some of the other interns were given their first project (they ended up having a very hectic second half of their internship :p).
Project 3 not only gave me an opportunity to learn Visual Basics but also created a huge impact on my work. I was really satisfied with what I achieved and used my learnings from this project to make the other automation project I was working on more efficient.
In between, I also worked on another industry analysis project but enjoyed this one as the team I was working with was very supportive and encouraging.
Takeaways
Kriti Chaturvedi: In a consult, apart from the technical details of your project, your personality and connections play an important role. You have to be very proactive and curious throughout the journey. The more connections you have, the more people you can approach for better opportunities. Also, you have to be very good with communication. When I was working on two projects simultaneously and the 3rd one was offered to me, I had to have that difficult conversation with my managers that I won’t be able to continue with these due to my bandwidth. Proper communication helped us maintain a healthy relationship and when the 3rd project was over I started working on the previous projects again.
This internship experience gave me a whole new perspective on things. Some of the key learnings that I feel will help me in the future: proactiveness, having the difficult conversations, people skills, business perspective and looking for the larger impact.
Jainam Doshi: This internship experience has dramatically changed my thinking, and I have a lot more clarity now about the aspects of learning that I should focus on in the fourth year. The main thing I want to focus on now is to deep dive into my presentation skills and learn more about the opportunities that lie ahead in the future. Of course, the previous courses helped me a lot in how to quickly think on my feet, and the course projects I've had up till now enabled me to work efficiently in a team and come up with a strong plan of action.
I also quickly learned new Data Visualisation software like Tableau, as we have some courses that teach MATLAB and R. I think that taking up a PoR (Events Manager at AZeotropy) along with acads greatly helped with managing my time at the firm effectively. Overall, our diverse curriculum helped me achieve what I wanted to showcase at PwC.
To conclude, this is the best Summer Internship I could have ever hoped for. I'm glad I waited for the right company, along with the rejections I faced. This is because each test, group discussion, and interview taught me something that prepared me for this opportunity!
If you have any further queries, feel free to reach out to us. All the best for your Intern season!