Hello, I am May
At Juniata College, I am an Accounting and Financial Management student. I was awarded the Outstanding Accounting Student Award by The Pennsylvania Institute of Certified Public Accountants. I am the Internal Auditor at Accounting Office, 2-year Resident Assistant, 2-year Treasurer for Juniata Activities Board.
Other than that, I was one of the Finalists at Bailey Oratorical Contest 2023 and a Team Member for Juniata Women's Tennis.
Last summer, I interned at Sisterson and Co. LLP as Audit & Tax Intern. This summer, I'm interning at EY (a Big 4 Accounting Firm) as an Assurance Intern at Philadelphia Office.
Credit: Olivia Marie '23
Pre-Internship: Starting Adulthood
The other day, I watched a Jenny Imm's YouTube video about adulthood life. She asked her audience which point of time in life that we actually become an adult. It's a good question, right?
I've been reflecting on that question a lot lately. I also started this conversation with some 'adults' from all ages around me, and no one really gives me a satisfactory answer. Everyone became an adult in different ways.
Regardless, I want to start calling myself an adult from now, as I'm finishing up college and soonly I will earn my own money and pay my own rent. This is probably a good mindset, but I'm definitely interested to see the adult I'm turning to by the end of this summer and one year from now.
Update: As part of my journey abroad, I finally moved in my apartment from Huntingdon BY MYSELF. I went shopping in Target and Trader Joe's at the same day. I wish I could show you how funny it was to see me carry 4 large shopping bags while trying to be looking good on the street. :)
Jenn Im. This is Adulting. YouTube, https://youtu.be/cGQRDLWO7is.
Week 1: Training and Technology
The training this week was all virtual. The interns got to set up our laptops and learnt about the audit procedures/practice. Technology was a big theme of our training, and what I learnt the most from this was the importance and dominance of technology in our current world.
Obviously, any international corporate has a massive, highly integrated system that they use to distribute documents throughout their offices in the globe. However, being an intern of one of those firms and able to navigate a corner of such system, I see myself not only so small to the whole firm, but also impressed how such system was built to keep documents consistent throughout the world wide offices. Technology has changed my point of view. Therefore, I can see being able to excel the current technology would give me a huge advance in my career. Nevertheless, this will be a big motivation for me to keep learning every day, both auditing skills and technological skills, and I am not the smartest person in the pond anymore,
P/s: On the left was one of the lunches I made from my apartment's kitchen during the lunch break from our virtual training. Probably I couldn't make this lunch if I were in the office or there were not any video conference applications.
Week 2: Office & Networking
Due to office renovation, the interns were finally able to work in office this week. Our office is located in 7th and 8th floor of One Commerce building on Market Street. In contraction to my imagination of normal corporate office, the seatings are quite flexible. There are a lot of desks, chairs, and conferences room that you can sit wherever you want. There are no assigned seats for anyone, even the Partners (super high position in firms/companies). So if you don't plan a head of time, you don't know who you will sit together tomorrow. Benefits of flexible seatings, in my opinion, is cost effectiveness (not everyone works in the office everyday), streamlines teamworks (team members find it easily to sit together and are not bounded to your initial seating assignment) and freshen your working environment everyday (this allows new ideas, new conversations come in.)
Being part of EY, I have networked (met) SO MANY people. I met interns from many PA universities, EY staff, seniors, managers, and even partners and got to learn different things. It is important to network, especially in public accounting, because audits is a people profession - you work with different people/clients and make sure you are good at conveying your opinions to them. :) In any profession, networking does helps us advance in our profession and practice our communication skills. After all, it is just fun to know (network) cool and fun people.
Week 3: Time Off-Happy the 4th!
Bbq, Candle Light Concert, Mi Quang (Vietnamese noodles), and Break
Week 4: huMp Day
My team worked in client office on Wednesday this week. Before I went, I was super excited and nervous whether I would do anything stupid. Thanks God I did not. I started living my place at 7AM to avoid the traffic while traveling to the client office, and got back home at 7PM. What is a better way to start your hump day at client office, right?
This is one of the highlights in my internship and important to my career development. I enjoyed my time and hope to be back next week. Hehe!
Disclaimer: The pictures were random pics that I took in the city this week to keep this page occupied and since I am obsessed with the city life, architectures, and buildings. :)
Week 5: Continuous Learning
TBD