Jack Shi

My role will be the Management Associate for Global Consumer Banking at Citibank, which is one of the biggest divisions at the retail bank. It is designed to be a rotation programme. The duration of the internship will be 10 weeks long, starting June 2021.

Ms. Bora Jin, the manager from the MBA Career Development and Training team referred me to this internship opportunity after drawing out all my strengths and weaknesses while also knowing my goal of working in banking. I truly appreciate the amount of time that Bora spent on my CV, which helped catch the recruiter’s eyes initially.

Before this opportunity at Citibank kicked in, Bora offered me massive help on guiding me with her professional insight. She told me the skills that the recruiters want to see before I went to any interviews. She was a middle person, linking me with people who went through the same interview process at the companies I was interested in. The connections, the opinions and the professional views provided by the Career Development and Training team really helped me achieve the internship.

The whole job searching experience for my internship was interesting. I managed to learn so much about the company culture from my mentor who is in a very senior position at Citibank. He told me about the work culture, the function of the team and the vision of the company from a top management’s perspective. I have to say my mentor boosted my interest in working for Citibank.

I also discovered more about myself while job searching. I thought investment banking represented the whole banking industry, but I discovered the different functions of each component such as insurance, loans, corporate banking ,wealth management, and retail banking, which I will soon be working in. I also realised the weaknesses in myself, and I reflected back on my achievements and losses in the past. I describe this as a self-reflection process which allowed me  to become a better fit for my  future role.

The MBA programme has provided me with a lot of information regarding what is out there in terms of the talent in Hong Kong, what makes me special. Besides the academic knowledge, the programme provides me with job resources by connecting me with a lot of people who will play key roles in my career development.

My goal that was set before joining the MBA hasn’t changed, but my perspective have. I always wanted to work within Investment Banking  in Hong Kong before I joined the MBA, as I thought that was all banking was about. But as I said, banking contains different components and I am glad that I now have a chance to experience something different.

One major practice I adopted is to approach my recruiters, including the Senior Director of the MBA programme, for their reasons behind accepting me in the first place. I want to find out the reasons why people would offer me a chance, what made me stand out and where my weaknesses lay. I also approached a member from the Career Development and Training team who does not know me that well for a mock interview. The member pointed out some perspectives that I missed, and things that I need to improve to get into the jobs I desired.

I also built my relationship with some other interviewers, to evaluate my performance at the interviews.  I will continue this practice as this is really helpful for my career building.

There is one highlight that I would like to talk about: The Capstone project, a course where we dig deep into a company. We needed to get an instant response from the peers and the professors and had to do a lot of research on the company. The skills that I gained equipped me to look at the company as a whole. We selected a listed company from Japan and we were able to come up with a new product service and long term strategy for the company. The course also tested our team working skills and we managed to come up with a very good presentation without rehearsal. The presentation was unforgettable and I was grateful to have been in such a strong team!