The Best Summer of my Life

“The best summer of my life.” Whenever anyone asks me how my summer was this is exactly my response. I had the opportunity to work at Grant Thornton LLP this summer out of their Markham office. Every aspect of the internship was a memorable experience from the training, the staff, challenges, and responsibility.

The first week the firm trains you, which was very informative; it was a great way to understand how the business works and the processes used by Grant Thornton. What I appreciated was that all the staff understood that you did not know anything about the business and auditing which gave me the freedom to ask as many questions as I wanted. Furthermore, it is apparent that they want to teach you about all aspects of the business and share their valuable experience of different clients they have been on and what they learned through the years with the firm.

Throughout the summer, I had the privilege of working in three areas of GT; which were Forensics, Independent Business Group, and Audit. Forensics was an interesting experience as you see the potentially fraudulent side of accounting. It definitely requires plenty of attention to detail as even the smallest oversight can change the outcome of the case.

After forensics I worked in IBG, there I primarily handled Notice to Readers along with T2 tax returns. I worked under a partner and two senior managers and to say they were helpful would be an understatement. I made many mistakes on my first few files and was so overwhelmed but they sat down with me and helped me work through them. They were very encouraging and told me that is exactly how everyone starts. Sure enough after a few files, I was completing them on my own and the partner would come and ask my opinion of how we should tax plan for the upcoming year for that specific client. It truly made me feel that even though I was an intern they thought I could bring value to the company and cared to hear my views.

Finally, I was in the audit practice, I went on three audits that included an educational institution, a construction company, and finally a public materials technology company. What I enjoyed about audit was the amount of interaction you get with the clients; you are actually building relationships with them and learning about their business. Furthermore, on an audit I was given low risk sections and the team was great in taking my questions and also giving me responsibility of the whole section and once I was done my section a manager would review it and teach me the areas I needed to improve on. However, it did not stop there, as I was getting comfortable with the low risk sections the managers would let me work on other parts of the file and I always had the opportunity to see the whole file so that I could understand how my work was influencing the other parts of the audit.

On the culture side, the people at the firm are absolutely wonderful, everyone was so welcoming and down to earth it feels like you are part of a family. Right from day one, they all treated you as if you were a full-time staff. Socials were fun, we had a day at Wonderland where everyone from the office came, we went on the rides, had a great lunch and did a scavenger hunt. In addition, on the Friday’s of an audit, the manager would take the team out to a restaurant lunch, which was a nice little treat.

Finally, all the interns at GT, BDO, & Crowe Soberman teamed up together in the annual Ultimate Frisbee Tournament. We got our butts kicked, but the tournament was a lot of fun it was an experience full of laughter despite the loss.  Afterward we went to Bier Market with all the staff that attended and we had such an enjoyable time with food and drinks.

Again, “the best summer of my life” it has been a truly great experience with Grant Thornton LLP and I look forward to rejoining the team next September. If any of you have, any questions please feel free to reach out to me.

Jason Kanji
Marketing Director, 2014 - 2015
Atkinson Professional Accounting Association
W: www.yuapaa.com
E: jason.kanji@yuapaa.com