A London Stock Exchange Group office building.
Through the Pinhead Institute I had the amazing opportunity of interning with the London Stock Exchange for two weeks this September. My interest primarily lies in computers, and I had the chance to work with some of the most brilliant people I have ever met in this field.
I started the week at Beaufort House in the offices of LCH.Clearnet, a company that was recently acquired by the Stock Exchange group. After getting redirected around the building several times, I finally got to meet with James Newman for a tour.
We decided to walk from Beaufort House to Paternoster Square, where the main offices are. The walk took us through downtown London, right under the Gherkin, and to St. Paul’s cathedral, directly adjacent to the London Stock Exchange Group offices.
The LSE has existed since 1698, when Johnathan Castaing began to list stock prices on the wall of his coffee shop. This fact blew me away, because I was now working for a company older than our country!
There has been no live trading floor in LSE since 1986, making computers a critical part of the trading system.
My first impression of the main offices was the unbelievable technology. All around the building were displays, with graphics designed by the special effects company behind the movie Gravity. I got the full tour of the building, which included board rooms, large open office areas, and the employee cafeteria (more of a high-end restaurant).
After that we got in a cab to the third office, an unlisted building that houses Advanced Platforms, the group I would spend the first week working with. Advanced Platforms is the group responsible for creating new technology within the LSEG ranging from hardware to software solutions. Their job is to make the systems run faster and more efficiently.
For that week I was treated more as an employee than an intern. I was issued a security badge for the building, and swiped in every day after commuting to work on the Tube. It was a very different experience, and really made me feel like a part of the company.
I worked next to James through the whole week and he helped me through any issues or questions I had. I was assigned a project I worked on throughout my two-week internship. While I can’t explain in detail, the project involved the configuration and documentation of software to be used within the group. This included both system management, software configuration, in-depth troubleshooting, and writing technical documentation. It was an important project, so I knew that I was doing work that was needed within the company.
It was amazing to have that opportunity, and definitely pushed me to do my best work!
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