A Day in the Life of a Financial Advice Intern

There are a few different forms that an internship at a financial planning or wealth management office can take. On one side of the spectrum you have what would be like an investment analyst role where you spend most of your time crunching numbers. On the other side is a financial planning assistant role, where you might be sitting in on client meetings, or working in a financial planning software. In any scenario, there are some job duties that will apply to almost any intern in a given day working in the financial advising industry.

An intern in wealth management always starts their day out in the same way – reading and replying to emails. Since you’re gonna be new to the firm, its not likely that there will be many emails from clients to get to. Mostly internal advisors or partners... Some of these you may have a quick answer for… others you will need to provide a timeline for… This part of your day can be pretty time consuming…. As a tip here, make sure to use the right amount of formality with your email reply's and always proofread them before sending…. Don’t let sloppy emails from partners make you lazy.

Getting coffee – From about 9am-10am every intern will be making mandatory coffee runs. But getting coffee for more senior associates or senior advisors does happen, and other times they may grab coffee for you too so its really not a big deal. But just know that getting coffee is not just a stereotype of interns.

Depending on your role and the time zone you work in, you may have some work to do at this point as the financial markets open. Performance measurement at the open or from yesterday’s closes… you may need to keep up on news for various portfolio positions… maybe place some client trades… or you might just have to update a financial plan with today’s values. Either way, there will likely be some responsibly surrounding market open and this could take up the rest of your mid to late morning.

Some days you will also have mid morning and lunch meetings. Again as in intern there won’t be much client interaction so we are mostly referring to internal meetings with you group or with a direct superior. These typically cover daily responsibility where you will report on what you are working on or what you have gotten done, or updates on projects so that a group of people can stay on the same page.

Meetings in general will take up much more time than many people expect. If you’re working in a role that has longer hours, many folks who have worked in these positions report that once all of your meetings are over around 3 or 4 pm is when your work day really starts.

[i]

i have weak excel skills so i'm never going to be a finance intern

[nikhilganesh]

Hey I want your advice on something, I graduated college last year and cleared my CFA level 1 around the same time. I couldn't get a job so I decided to sit for level 2 in May this year. If I clear level 2 should I write level 3 immediately (November this year) and is it worth writing level 3 with zero work experience. Thanks for your time, love your videos.

[ericspaulding]

Hello,

I had a quick question. I have been doing some research into what jobs in finance have the best quality of life. Unfortunately, I haven't found any clear answers. Therefore, I was wondering what jobs have the best pay and good working hours? I don't mind working on either side whether that is the investment side or corporate side of finance.

[zakarygrue]

I’m transitioning from an insurance based company into a more AUM focused company currently.

How often do you use annuity end VUL type products. Also how do you typically help with tax problems without insurance if you don’t use it?

[jamesmusgrave]

Hey Aj, at what point do you think it's no longer worth doing an internship? For example I am working full time after finishing my degree but it's in a banks "payments team" and I sometimes feel I don't have enough base actual finance or investment experience to apply for actual jobs yet.