Project-based Internship with SEB Innovation Center – Anhelina (Ukraine)

Have you been wondering where to find practical opportunities throughout or after your studies?

It is possible to do it on the University of Tartu Futulab website! The University of Tartu Futulab is a platform where you can find many career development offers. From the university’s side, this is a way of showing support for their students and reminding them that there are lots of projects that they can be part of to facilitate their development. In Futulab, you can find internship and employment opportunities, join a project-based internship, find information about events, create a student profileparticipate in the Leader Program, and have an appointment in UT counseling center. Note that the Student Newsletter that the Marketing Department of the UT is sending to your email notifies you about newly posted internships and opportunities, so don’t forget to check it out as well!

Delta Centre

In this blog post, I also want to share my experience with Futulab and tell you more about the project I have been involved in. I am a first-year Bachelor of Business Administration student, and at the beginning of the spring semester, I decided that this was the right time to immerse myself in the new project. While browsing the Futulab website, I came across a project-based internship called “Robo-Advisor.” In general, a project-based internship is a university-wide course (SVMJ.02.014) that all students can take as an elective or optional. Students can take part as team members or as project idea authors. Usually, you get the task that an individual or organization created. While solving it, you acquire practical experience, and theoretical knowledge and have a chance to boost your soft and hard skills. The course occurs twice a year, in the autumn and spring semesters. You can only participate in one project at the same time. Each project team can have 3-10 students from different curricula and degrees, including Bachelor, Master, and Ph.D. students. Students, organizations, alumni, and university employers can submit an idea for the project-based internship. You can submit your own idea at https://futulab.ut.ee/en/project-based-internship/.

My internship was provided by SEB Innovation Center, located at the University of Tartu Delta Center. The task of my team was to conduct user-testing of the Robo-Advisor tool, which assists SEB bank clients in making investment decisions. We managed to grab lots of knowledge, starting from determining the most efficient way of doing the testing, approaching people and ending with analyzing the obtained results. Then a presentation was made to the stakeholders. Doing research for an actual project of SEB bank is a big deal! It is backed up by immense responsibility but accompanied by cheerful gatherings with team members and a friendly atmosphere in the SEB Innovation Center. We received helpful and practical advice from the creators of the project who were Fredrik Milani (Head of Digital Strategy at SEB Baltic | Associate Professor at the University of Tartu) and Kristina Lillo (Innovation Lead at SEB Eesti | SEB Tartu Innovation Centre Manager). We also created lots of memories that will stay with us after the completion of the project. The most memorable moment for me was our first user testing and how new and a bit scary it was for us at the beginning.

Individual Study Session

As well as our farewell dinner with the whole team will always remain a positive memory and a sign that we did a really good job!

As the internship is still considered a course and was part of our study plan, we were obligated to complete diverse tasks on the Moodle platform and participate in the mid-term seminar that aimed to support us during the internship. We will write a project summary that will be published on praktika.ut.ee/projektipraktika webpage. We will also receive six credits when the course is finally over.

I’m so grateful for this opportunity; it was a pleasure to work with everyone who was part of this journey. I highly encourage you to utilize the opportunities provided by the university fully. I wish you luck and lots of career prospects!

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