Skills enough for internship?

Hi guys, finally I decided to create an account on this interesting forum and ask you some things that I've been wondering about for a while.

I've got 2 years left to my graduation and think that's it's about time to do some internships now. The thing is that I am quite afraid of getting into real world of banking. I don't know if my skills are sufficient enough to do the required work. Sure, I've been (theoretically) studying all aspects of finance (valuations, DCF, accounting etc). But I would shit my pants if I suddenly got the task to make some analysis about a company/market, since I've never done it in real life. I also have quite a low knowledge of Excel.

English isn't my first language either. Sure, we have a lot of English litterature over here in Scandinavia, but I feel way more comfortable in my native language.

So these things are worrying me. Will I make it? Or will I fail and embarrass myself for the whole industry? Perhaps is it better to wait and study more, so that I feel more comfortable with finance. But on the other hand, I miss valuable internships for future applications.

So what do you think, guys. How skilled do you have to be to make a successful internship? Will my language/practical experience/Excel be a problem? Will I get formal training and guidance before we start? Or do they expect that you already know a lot of things?

In other words, will I make it or will I fail?

2 Comments
 
Best Response

For example, "Responsibility from the start for Investment Banking Summer Analyst @ J.P. Morgan *Perform valuation analyses using various methodologies including discounted cash flow, leveraged buyout, trading comparables, and transaction comparables *Build detailed financial models to evaluate performance under various operating scenarios and to analyze the impacts of various capital structures and potential M&A transactions"

Sure, I've read about these stuff in school... but If they asked my to perform such things directly, I would most definitely fail.

Therefore I wonder, how much do they expect from you from the beginning? Or do you get formal training in the start, and learn how do to everything you will be asked to do?

 

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