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Yankees Lose!!
June 8, 2002

On Tuesday, June 4th, I began my internship with KPMG.  I believe it is an eight week internship.  The first day was orientation at my local office at the Fleet Center [in Kennedy Plaza] downtown in Providence.  I was issued my mailbox, my laptop, and a thousand different passwords and codes to remember for things such as login passwords, secure IDs, timecard passwords, and even a voicemail password.  

At any job you begin, the 1st week is very hectic. It is kind of like that first week at school when all your professors give you that syllabus and you don't have any idea how and when you are going to learn and complete your assignments.

On Wednesday and Thursday [June 5th and 6th], I was at Assurance Training at KPMG's headquarters in Montvale, NJ.  At training I met close to a hundred interns from 13 offices of the northeast region.  The other interns were very polite and sociable.  I actually got along best with the Boston interns who obviously were all Red Sox fans--go figure.

We went to Yankee Stadium on Wednesday night so I was very happy about that; however, we were bused from the Holiday Inn over to the Stadium, and of course, the bus I was on broke down in the Bronx a half hour before the first pitch.  

We waited for another bus to pick us up; however, it couldn't since it was blocked in from traffic.  So, about 50 interns walked a half hour in the middle of the Bronx to go see my Yanks lose 4-3 to the Orioles.  They had a rally going when Jorge Posada hit a two run homer in the eighth.  When going to the bottom of the 9th, they had Rocky 2 playing on the big screen with the Rocky theme music to get the crowd going.  I loved it!

At the training sessions, we had a partner from the NY office speak to us for about hour about the profession, KPMG, Enron, Andersen, and his experience with the firm.  We were given a presentation about an overview of the firm as well as a video about Security.  The second day we had breakout sessions where we were split up into different rooms and worked on one of the tests.  We had to pass several tests to receive CPE credit so we can work with the firm:

• Respect and Dignity - all about treating others as you would want to be treated; included a sexual harassment test
  
• Getting Started: Audit Basics - basically getting us to understand the importance of dressing professionally in the workplace
  
• Audit - all about the whole audit workflow process from planning to conclusion
  
• Independence - about how you have to stay independent in the public accounting profession (e.g., if one of your parents works for General Electric, then you can't work on that engagement)
  
• Technology Tips - how to use VECTOR software and Timnex (i.e. software used for submitting time sheet data electronically as well as expenses such as lodging, mileage, etc.) 

On Friday, I was back in Providence doing more tests and getting to know my local office employees, all of which have been extremely nice so far.  Every intern is assigned a performance manager in which he or she evaluates your progress with the firm over the internship.  We have to set and submit goals to this manager and get evaluated on if we achieve them or not.  This performance has something to do with possibly receiving an offer.  

It is very professional in the Providence office, dress is business casual.  There are approximately 100 employees.  Administrative Assistants have their own cubes, and managers and partners have offices.  Also Client Support Service people have offices.  The staff like myself [Assurance Interns], 1st and 2nd year Associates find open cubes if available to do work; however, usually we are at a client's office.  The other side of the office is the Tax department which is set-up similar to Assurance [services].

Throughout my first week, I was treated not as a dumb intern but as a first year associate.  It is highly professional but fun and exciting so far. On Monday [June 10], I began my first assignment at URI.  I am looking forward to it.

Questions for Jason?

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