Lifelong Learning

Nicholas Struzenski

Nicholas Struzenski '18, Ernst & Young

Major:

International business & management

Internship title:

Financial services advisory intern.

How I got this internship:

I got this internship by networking with family and personal connections.

What I do, day to day:

I intern in Ernst & Young's (EY's) Business Advisory Program, where I focus on risk and compliance in the Financial Services Office. My client is a mid-sized bank, and we help them improve their anti-money-laundering systems (AML) so they are able to comply with government regulations. My day-to-day work is constantly changing, but most days, I’m conducting investigations of accounts that have been deemed “high-risk” due to a number of different factors.

Other internships:

Last summer, I interned for a small data and analytics company in Boston on their sales and business development teams. Although the environment was completely different from EY, I really enjoyed the company and the people I worked with.

Most valuable part of this experience:

The most valuable part of the internship is the amount of resources that are available to me. I’ve had amazing opportunities to network, conduct informational interviews and connect with EY employees across all service lines and different parts of the world. Our culture here promotes open communication and collaboration, which has allowed me to learn a lot.

Advice for students considering internships:

My one piece of advice is to be open minded. The great thing about an internship is that it’s a chance to try something that you are not bound to commit to long term, and I think a lot of times people don’t realize that. It’s easy to get hung up on a name brand or get hyper-focused on a certain idea, but in reality, the more open-minded you are, the more opportunities you’ll have. Sometimes the experiences that are slightly outside of our interests are the ones we can learn from the most, and an internship is an opportunity to sample a career path without a binding commitment. It’s one of the great things about a liberal-arts education—it allows you to be flexible, adapt to dynamic environments and easily learn new skills.

How this internship has helped me:

I’ve developed some important technical skills throughout my time here at EY, but I’ve developed some key soft skills as well. The collaborative culture here has taught me a lot about how to successfully navigate a team environment, what it takes to successfully network and how to fully apply yourself in an office setting. Figuring out how to collaborate and learn from people of different backgrounds, experiences and working styles has been a challenging but rewarding experience, something that I’ll be able to apply to Dickinson and beyond.

Post-Dickinson plans:

As of now, I’m not entirely sure what I want to do in the long-term future. After Dickinson, I hope to be doing something similar to what I’m doing now, financial services consulting for a large firm. I’d also like get my MBA in the near future. Down the road, I like the idea of going into higher education. Wherever I may find myself, I hope that I’m challenged, working with good people and constantly learning.

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Published August 8, 2017