Aaron GK Strategy internship Q+A
- rebecca46125
- Nov 27, 2024
- 2 min read
How did you find out about the opportunity?
I found out about this opportunity after completing I Have a Voice’s mentorship programme. Having worked with my mentor, a senior Public Affairs Officer, I was able to learn so much about the Public Affairs industry over the course of the year and felt confident and supported in applying for this role.
Where/ which organisation did you complete the internship/ work experience with?
I completed a 3 week internship with GK Strategy, a public affairs consultancy based in Westminster, London. I worked across their Advocacy and Insights teams.
Did the placement meet your expectations?
The placement exceeded my expectations. This was my first experience of working in Public Affairs and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I felt like a member of the team from day one and was trusted to work on a wide range of exciting tasks. The team at GK were all very approachable and supportive and were more than happy to sit down and chat with me about their career journeys in public affairs and gave me great advice.
What did you enjoy about your experience? What did you learn while you were working there?
I enjoyed having the opportunity to carry out relevant and exciting work. I was fortunate to begin my placement the same day as the government came back from summer recess. This meant that I had the opportunity to investigate how a 4-day work week, the Autumn Budget and VAT on independent school fees could impact/benefit the company’s clients. I also had the opportunity to tune into debates in the Commons and Lords and attend discussions held by think tanks. I learnt a number of things whilst on placement such as stakeholder mapping and research, how to carry out media monitoring, and policy analysis. I also had the opportunity to help out at two events that took place during my placement. The opportunity to work across both teams at GK was particularly rewarding as I got to work on public affairs matters whilst also helping the insights team with their political due diligence and consultancy work.
How has this opportunity informed your future career choices?
This opportunity facilitated by IHAV has been really useful in informing my future career choices. The opportunity to complete an extended period of time at a leading public affairs consultancy has provided a solid foundation in which I can continue to develop my future career journey in the industry. As I head into my final year of university, I am now actively seeking out public affairs roles and upon reading the job descriptions I now have a much better understanding of what is required of me as an applicant and I feel a lot more confident in applying for these roles as a result of what I learnt on placement. My time on placement has also allowed me to start building a network with people already working in the industry and I feel given the warm reception I received from the team that I could comfortably reach out to them if I had any questions or if I was seeking potential opportunities.
Three weeks is short, so it says a lot that you still got to dig into concrete policy questions rather than just admin. The VAT on independent school fees example is a good reminder that “one line in the Budget” can ripple into totally different sectors depending on who the client is. Slightly off-topic: the way you describe figuring out what works for different stakeholders made me think of personal “fit” problems too — like how StyleLookLab tries to match options to the person rather than forcing one-size-fits-all.
I like that you called out how approachable people were and that they were willing to talk through their career journeys — that’s the sort of thing you can’t really get from reading about the industry. Did you get any advice on how to keep up with policy developments without drowning in noise? Weird comparison, but your “supported + trusted” combo reminded me of trying new creative tools like imgg — you learn fastest when you’re allowed to experiment a bit.
The mentorship-to-internship pathway you describe feels genuinely practical — you got context first, then a short placement where you could actually apply it. I’d be interested to hear what surprised you most about day-to-day consultancy life in Westminster (pace, writing style, or how often priorities change overnight). Mild tangent: I’ve seen this directory used for finding niche tools, and it made me think how many little systems sit behind “quick turnaround” work like you’re describing.
It’s interesting you were on both Advocacy and Insights — that mix seems like the sweet spot for seeing how research actually turns into messaging and outreach. When you were looking at things like the Autumn Budget or VAT on school fees, were you mostly summarising, or did you get to add your own “so what” angle for different client types? Side note: anything with time pressure makes me think of little tools like CaesarCipher — not the same field, but the same need to estimate effort fast.
The part about feeling like a team member from day one rang true — in short internships, that’s the difference between “shadowing” and actually learning the job. Curious what you found hardest at first: turning fast-moving policy news into something useful for clients, or the stakeholder mapping side? Small tangent: after days like that I end up decompressing with something simple like BlockBlast for ten minutes.