Job Responsibilities
The Intern will support both the Finance and Marketing teams at Koppers Performance Chemicals’ headquarters office. This hybrid internship provides hands‑on experience in two core business functions within Koppers Performance Chemicals: accounting and financial operations, and market research and business case development.
Finance & Accounting
- Support daily and monthly accounting activities, including invoice processing, account reconciliations, and data entry.
- Assist with financial reporting by preparing spreadsheets, updating financial models, and validating data accuracy.
- Analyze cost trends, production expenses, and operational metrics to support financial planning.
- Participate in internal audit activities, documentation reviews, and compliance tasks.
- Contribute to process improvement initiatives within the Finance team.
Marketing & Business Development
- Conduct market research to inform new business opportunities, customer segments, and understand competitive landscapes. (An intern most likely will not be evaluating the opportunities, but rather helping to inform the decision making)
- Assist in developing business cases for new products, markets, or strategic initiatives.
- Analyze industry trends, pricing benchmarks, and customer needs to support commercialization strategy development
- Assist in the preparation of presentations, reports, and summaries for leadership review.
- Collaborate with cross‑functional teams, including R&D, Sales, Finance, and Operations, to gather data and insights for market assessments and budget development.
- Develop marketing commercialization budgets to support marketing efforts required to execute individual strategic marketing initiatives
- Create a marketing expense analysis (data model) for managing marketing spend that is communicated on a dashboard and allows for daily expense tracking and management by service providers
Customer Service/Engineering
- Support project-based work with the Customer Service and Engineering teams to gather requirements, analyze data, and help advance commercial and operational initiatives.
Candidate Qualifications/ Requirements
- Currently pursuing a bachelor’s degree in Accounting, Finance, Marketing, Business Administration, Economics, Chemical Engineering, or a related field.
- Strong analytical and problem‑solving skills.
- Proficiency in Microsoft Excel and PowerPoint. Familiarity with data analysis tools is a plus.
- Strong written and verbal communication skills required
- Ability to manage multiple tasks and work effectively across two functional teams.
- Interest in manufacturing, chemicals, or industrial markets preferred.
- Strong collaboration skills and comfortable meeting with a variety of business leaders
- Strong writing and familiarity with using AI to help inform and develop communication tools
- General understanding of qualitative and quantitative research approaches
- Ability to work in a culture focused on Zero Harm daily safety initiatives and practices
Koppers Inc. and its subsidiaries are equal opportunity employers. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, veteran status, or any other category or characteristic protected by federal law, state, or local law.
Skills Required
- Currently pursuing a bachelor's degree in Accounting, Finance, Marketing, Business Administration, Economics, Chemical Engineering, or a related field
- Strong analytical and problem-solving skills
- Proficiency in Microsoft Excel and PowerPoint
- Strong written and verbal communication skills
- Ability to manage multiple tasks and work effectively across two functional teams
- Strong collaboration skills and comfort meeting with a variety of business leaders
- Strong writing skills and familiarity with using AI to inform and develop communication tools
- General understanding of qualitative and quantitative research approaches
- Ability to work in a culture focused on Zero Harm daily safety initiatives and practices
- Familiarity with data analysis tools
- Interest in manufacturing, chemicals, or industrial markets
What We Do
Koppers, headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is a global wood preservation technology company that creates safe and environmentally responsible solutions to solve our customer’s most important challenges. Our products and services are used in a variety of niche applications in a diverse range of end-markets including railroad, specialty chemical, utility, residential lumber, agriculture, aluminum, steel, rubber and construction industries. With more than 2,100 employees, we maintain a global manufacturing and distribution network, with facilities in North America, South America, Australasia, China and Europe. Koppers is committed to living a culture of Zero Harm that places the care of our people, our environment and our communities first at all times. The company is also a member of the American Chemistry Council and dedicated to adopting its Responsible Care® initiative at all of our locations worldwide.
