At the beginning of the search for my internship, it was clear to me that I want to work in a company which operates in an industry way beyond communication science. Throughout the process of searching for internship placements, I decided that I want to work in the financial industry. It offers an interesting job environment, especially for students with a non-financial education background and large financial companies often have a lot of open internship offers. In the end, I applied for a marketing internship in the Cash Market Department at Deutsche Börse, which is Germany’s stock exchange and got accepted through a very easy application process. Something that I would not have expected in the beginning.
Deutsche Börse has various business areas but the core service is to offer clients a platform on which they can trade stocks and other financial products in a secure, transparent and efficient environment. It is a company with over 5,000 employees in six countries spread across three continents. The company is truly international and operates in a global competition. In my opinion it is a very unique company, comparable to a maximum of ten companies.
The tasks I did during my internship were split up into two areas. In the first area, I was in the supporting the Key Account Manager for the Cash Market marketing section in her daily business. This includes the preparation and publication of online material like company, think-pieces and the online support of Initial Price Offerings (IPOs). Next to that I helped to plan and organize various events, including a workshop for over 50 people. In the second area of my tasks, I was in supporting function for group-wide projects as well as running my own projects. For example, I helped to plan and implement a marketing Key Performance Index (KPI) project, as well as designing a company-wide survey and conduction Social Media Analysis. This highly motivated me and I really liked working independently.
My research focused on LinkedIn marketing in the b2b-section of the financial industry, which prove to be more challenging than expected. The industry is very far away from being native in Social Media and just slowly adjust to the overdue change. Thus, my research on how different publication and graphic presentation techniques affect the followers’ interaction with the updates on LinkedIn actually could add value to the Social Media strategy of Deutsche Börse. This added value through my research showed me that with a little initiative you could actually change things, even in a big company like Deutsche Börse.
Lastly, on a personal level, I also learned how to adjust in times of change in your job. During my internship my department got reorganized and a lot of the projects I worked on were on hold. I learned that one of the most important skills in the job environment is to be able to adjust to new conditions all the time and try to see the positive angle of the situation.
Overall, I really enjoyed my five months at Deutsche Börse and I can only recommend to work within the financial industry. At first it might be a bit challenging to understand certain processes but it is a highly challenging and rewarding industry as well.
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