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Being part of Team GMK - an intern's perspective


Hi, my name is Cieran and I study Accounting and Finance at the University of Leicester.

On my first day of starting my internship at Grant McKnight, I was quite apprehensive of what to expect however, from when I stepped foot inside the office, I was greeted with a warm welcome by everyone at Grant McKnight and this made me feel at ease immediately.

Immediately, I was shown the ropes of how Grant McKnight operates and the different types of cloud accounting software they use. I knew I had to learn to at least navigate these softwares quickly because Grant McKnight is a paperless firm and therefore all of their work is online, thus making it crucial to learn it right away. Later on in the week, I had the privilege of observing an initial client meeting and learnt how Grant McKnight builds a relationship with a new client. With initial client meetings, I learnt that most of the time it is about listening to the client's past and presents ventures and getting to know them from there.

The following week saw me further develop my skills on the different types of software that Grant McKnight uses and to get more involved with their day-to-day work. This meant I was processing Anti Money Laundering checks on clients and carrying out risk assessments. Along with doing this, I was creating, testing and improving Grant McKnight’s standard operating procedures. This was extremely useful to be involved with because not many interns would be directly involved with helping to shape a business’ standard operating procedures moreover, this will improve my attention to detail, which is crucial for the accounting practice.

Away from the work, I had the pleasure of attending the soft launch of a new Indian restaurant in Birmingham and with not being a huge fan of Indian food, I actually really enjoyed my time there and the food was superb.

The third week was the most useful as this is where I was able to further develop my accounting knowledge by processing tax returns from scratch and balancing trial balance accounts by using information from The Profit and Loss accounts and The Statements of Financial Position. Balancing trial balance accounts prove to be a challenge because the debits and credits total were not balancing. After numerous attempts at balancing the accounts, I was able to persevere to balance the accounts correctly with help from the director and was happy I was able to overcome the challenge.  

The following week saw me create and run payroll for a business and this is one of the most important things to provide for a business because the employees of a business rely on this money for their own well being. When running the payroll, I got first hand experience of how businesses are using the Government Furlough Scheme and how it has helped to pay business’ employees.

My overall experience at Grant McKnight has been amazing and to learn under people who have a wealth of experience under their belt is priceless. I will most definitely take away the skills I have learnt at Grant McKnight and use them in future employment. 

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