Summer Placement Review

It was a very good placement to get an insight into the real practice. Everyone was very friendly and understanding in the office and make you feel part of the team. Over all, it was a great experience.

Everyone in the office made an effort to include you in meetings and gave interesting tasks to complete. It was important to be proactive and ask people to be involved in their meetings but that is part of using your initiative. There are other things that go on which would be good to get invited to but it is understandable that everyone has things they need to get on with. It is very obvious that everyone makes an effort though.

There is support throughout the entire period of the internship program, from the main office in London and in both Scottish Offices (Edinburgh and Glasgow). You are appointed a supervisor and a buddy who are there to offer support and help you with any problems. In my experience, my supervisor was an experience team member who monitors your effort and progress and my buddy was a graduate who was friendly and easy to relate to. Although they are there for support, everyone else in the office is more than happy to help out as well.

Everyone in the office will ask you to do small tasks throughout the day that can take from 10 minutes to a few hours. There was a project to which would keep you busy when no one came forward with anything to do. You were able to stop and start the project which meant you were able to experience other things when you were given the opportunity to do so. Sometimes people can forget you are an intern and you do not know where to source relevant information from (websites and internal folders) but when you speak up they are very happy to help.

The tasks I was given were being used to present to clients such as measurements of buildings (NIA) and investment summaries. Everything is read over by other team members to ensure information is correct. I would be given pieces of work to read over before sending it way to clients or to be printed which made me feel like I was given some responsibility as they would trust my final judgment and consider your opinion. Other small things like being given keys to the offices and codes to the doors also made me feel like I was trusted.

It has really opened up my eyes to the real practice. Seeing what I have been taught in university and applied in the real practice made it all fall into place. I am certain that this experience will make my final year studies easier. Having this experience has also gave me the chance to discuss the industry with professionals and see what the current issues are which could be interesting to research for my dissertation. It is also important to get exposed to the market and meet new contacts which is what this internship has allowed me to do.

Everyone was very friendly and professional at the same time.

It would have been good to have planned tasks set ahead before starting the internship. This did not seem to be a problem though as people would start having tasks to do when they where reminded that you were in the office. My supervisor made it a priority that I had experience in everything that was noted in the internship programme which was very good. The Structure of the internship was put together by the London office, making it impractical and almost impossible to fit it into the day to day business of the smaller Scottish offices. However, my supervisor did successfully adapted the structure to ensure I got the most out of my time with C&W.

There was no external training or anything like that as it would be unnecessary. I was there to see how the office worked and what the real practice was like. I suppose the training would have been the time I spent with the professional team members, listening in on meetings and being asked my opinion; generally learning how to act in a professional office. Being taken along to various properties and being talked though issues that can arise when trying to arrange a lease or an investment was a learning curve, and by having this valuable time with experienced team members, I was able to learn a lot.

I would enjoy working for this company in the future.

Excellent social scene between other team members, interns and graduates.

Glasgow is a city which is not to expensive to live in. Underground costs £1.20 for a single, however, the office is central and is walking distance from many parts of the city. Nights out are cheaper in Glasgow than in Edinburgh but these costs are not excessive. It can be quite expensive to get the train in and out of Edinburgh (£14 - £19 return from Glasgow to Edinburgh). Living in the city is not extremely expensive though.

The nightlife in these cities are good with variety of clubs and pubs for every day of the week. Student nights are big in both cities during the week (Mon – Fri). It can be a bit more expensive during the weekend but that it the same with every city.

Plenty of nights out to get invited to. Office events were also organised for team members to get out and socialise with each other. Usually out once a week with other professionals meeting up from around the city (usually organised by the graduates). This is a great opportunity to network.