Response 12

Graduating Year: 2009
Major: Finance & Corporate Reporting (International Studies Minor)

What company did you intern with?
BAC Credomatic Network – a joint venture between GE Consumer Finance and a Nicaraguan billionaire (GE owns 49.99% of the company). It is a banking (checking, savings, private banking, etc.) and credit (cards, loans, etc.) company that operates throughout Central America (Mexico, Costa Rica, Panama, El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, and Nicaragua) and also has a presence in Florida and the Cayman Islands. It is one of the top 3 banks in the region.

Where were you located?
San Jose, Costa Rica. Our offices were located in the city center. San Jose is corporate headquarters with hundreds of employees spread out across a dozen building throughout the city center.

What was your position?
I was a Finance Intern staffed mostly on productivity projects. I reported directly to the CFO of the bank and also reported to the Financial Planning & Analysis director and Finance Decision Support Leader. I also assisted with projects in Accounting and Mergers & Acquisitions.

What were your basic responsibilities?
I provided analytical support for key productivity initiatives that involved detailed research and interacting with marketing, collections, customer service, sourcing, IT, credit card operations, productivity leader, and finance staff from each of the seven countries. I was also responsible for either presenting or being present when data that I collected, selected, and compiled was being used. When not actively staffed on productivity projects (i.e. when the finance leaders were busy closing the second quarter at the end of June/beginning of July), I was able to assist the Accounting & Treasury staff with some of their projects.

How many hours did you work per week?
I typically arrived at around 8 AM and worked until 7 PM which comes out to about 55 hours but lunches were pretty long so 50 hours was probably pretty typical.

Describe a typical day of work.
I would arrive at 8 AM, catch up on e–mail, discuss projects that I had made progress on the night before with my boss(es) and then incorporate their comments and continue researching. I would often need to interact with people from all over the company to get this data and then quantify savings and increased Contributed Value by benchmarking our performance. Most days, there was a meeting (either in–person or telephonic) discussing productivity strategy, what direction we were moving in, etc. Sometimes I would be presenting, other times I was taking notes to incorporate the changes in to decks.

What did you like best about your internship?
I loved the exposure that I had and the opportunities to present to senior level executives. I presented directly to the CEO of the bank and to a senior GE executive. I also had regular exposure to the CFO and key members of his staff. I also attending a monthly meeting of the top 30 executives of the bank since a lot of my slides were being presented which was a great experience (and seven hours of non–stop Spanish!). Two of my bosses were local people who had been championed by the GE leadership of the joint venture and one of them was a GE employee on GE payroll. I worked closely with several GE black belts (one of the top Six Sigma quality ratings) in discussing productivity strategy and processes to support a lean organization. I thought that the exposure to the GE culture was great.

What did you like least about your internship?
Several of the people that I worked with only spoke Spanish which was usually great but after a long day and trying to resolve a complex issue before going home, speaking Spanish could be frustrating but looking back it was great because it forced me to get better with my Spanish.

What did you think of the company as a whole?
I think that BAC Credomatic is a great company. It is the preeminent banking brand in Central America and is growing very quickly. My exposure to the GE culture and way of doing things was also great and I would highly recommend a GE internship/job after working with numerous GE employees.

Can you offer any tips for interviewing with this particular company?
The interview process focused on behavioral questions not on technical aspects of the position. They were very flexible on finding a project that would engage me and also benefit them.

Considering your experience, would you recommend this internship to other students?
This internship is being transitioned to a full–time position and they really don't have many interns (it's not an established program) but I definitely recommend a GE internship.