Hear from Onyinye as she shares how interning at Snapchat, Lloyds and AXA shaped her career path and helped her land a top consultancy role.
Over the course of my Business Management degree, I completed three internships, including my placement year. Each one shaped my career direction in a different way and ultimately helped me secure a graduate role at a top American management consultancy firm several months before graduation.
I found my placement year through the 10,000 Interns Foundation. I originally submitted a general sales application aiming for a summer role, but Snapchat reached out and invited me to interview for their placement programme instead. The four-stage interview process was intense, and it taught me how to articulate my skills and experiences clearly in a professional setting. My first internship, at Lloyds Banking Group at the end of first year, gave me my first taste of finance industry recruitment, which is noticeably different from sales processes. The summer before my final year, I worked at AXA Investment Managers as an Institutional Sales and Client Service Intern, a role closely aligned with my Snapchat placement.
At Lloyds I worked on an internal product team, which gave me visibility into how cross-functional teams operate behind the scenes. The other two roles were client-facing. At Snapchat I managed a portfolio of large organisations advertising on the platform, delivered campaigns that hit client KPIs while meeting Snapchat’s revenue targets, and presented new advertising products to educate clients on our evolving capabilities. Building relationships with clients outside the office was a big part of the job and something I genuinely enjoyed.
Business Management gave me the frameworks to understand client businesses quickly, from marketing strategy to organisational behaviour. Concepts I studied in lectures, including consumer behaviour, financial resources and stakeholder management, became practical tools I used every day. The combination of internal and client-facing experience also helped me appreciate how different functions within a business connect.
These experiences gave me concrete examples that closely aligned with my graduate job description. By the time I was applying, I had become meticulous about answering interview questions concisely using the STAR technique and the Power of 3. I researched each organisation thoroughly and, as the rounds progressed, used LinkedIn to learn about my interviewers ahead of each stage, which made rapport building feel natural.
My placement year sharpened my time management and organisation skills enormously. I now approach every assignment in a structured way, setting priorities and giving myself mini deadlines so my workload stays manageable.
Build up your LinkedIn profile! Most of what I know about sales came from conversations with people in my network who took the time to share their journeys. Apply for spring weeks in first year and summer internships every year you can. Show up to interviews with a can-do attitude and practise articulating your skills until it feels natural. The conversations and the practice add up.
BSc Business Management (with Year in Industry)
Meet Onyinye, a Business student and netball player. Learn more about her experience at Birmingham and how careers suppo...
