Monitoring Workload Manager for Level 2 Support for IBM Tivoli Monitoring Review

My placement with IBM this year has been a thoroughly enjoyable and worthwhile experience, my job role was based in Level 2 Technical Support, in which I feel my organisational skills and time management were really put to the test. I managed to branch out of my role to a lot of small side project alongside my primary job, this helped me to network and to increase my technical knowledge through various educational exercises made available to me through the intranet.

Working within a global team proved a struggle to begin with especially when I had just started, but as the year went on I felt less like a student intern and more like a valued employee. They always went out of their way to say how my work was appreciated and made a real difference to the team, which was reassuring, as I was very nervous to begin with.

I had 3 managers I reported to, 1st and 2nd Line managers and an early professionals manager. Between the 3 of them I always felt like I could turn to one of them for advice or reassurance, I had some tough personal times throughout the year and the team of them helped me to get through them in a professional manner.

My actual day job didn't take up too much of the day, but I looked around and found other work to immerse myself in, these opportunities to help were always readily available, and I found a number of the opportunities in different teams and after a few months my managers were entrusting me with a higher workload which definitely kept me busy.

After a few months my managers allocated me more work and I started up internal projects of my own, regarding our social media analytics and started working on 3 different social platforms, all of which my team had discussed in the past but never implemented. I also ran an internal education session teaching other employees how to code a basic website, this helped me to gain confidence in teaching other people and in presenting, as it was done in a safe space.

Throughout this year I've been able to increase my technical understanding especially in certain coding languages, despite learning the bases of these at University, seeing them in a real life example has helped me to understand them properly. My time management skills I have improved I feel will help with the challenges the rest of my degree presents. I have also been able to work on my presenting skills, both in conference calls and face-to-face, I feel I will be able to take these skills into the workplace for my career.

From day one the atmosphere within my team felt very friendly and welcoming, I instantly felt like I was part of the team and felt like I fitted in very well. The whole office is very segmented but I was tasked to organise Customer Service Week which was a week of internal office activities to celebrate those who work in Customer Service. This helped to bring together different teams and areas of the office.

The internship overall was very well structured and organised right from the start, upon getting the job offer I was emailed my contract within one working week. The induction was really clear about the business conduct guidelines and what would be expected of us throughout the update year. My team helped me to find my feet in terms of my day job, but IBM had a really good internal website where all the interns could ask questions. My Early Professional Manager really helped me with what was expected of me in terms of a placement.

I feel that as I come to the end of this year and reflect back on how I've grown as an employee and a person, IBM really has helped me to become a more employable person, and more of an asset to a team. The people in my team have particularly invested a lot of time and effort into my training and helping me with understanding a lot of the internal processes. IBM as a company invested in me in terms of having the opportunity to do internal education on presentations, technical training and people management.

I'm eager to apply back to IBM as a graduate and really keen to get a graduate role with them, I really feel like I fit in well with the company and with the team I got to work with this year.

For those student lucky enough to be located in Central London, all the interns went to a local pub/bar and went for a few drinks, this was great for an opportunity for people to get to know each other outside of a working context. As far as my team, we went out for meals locally for holidays, or people birthdays or when the weather was nice! There was a bi-weekly gathering at one of the interns houses to watch films and relax after work which was really enjoyable.

The cost of living in outer West London was a little expensive for what we got, and being just outside the oyster zone didn't help, but it didn't stop us being able to have a good time! I would recommend trying to live within the oyster zone if you are based in/around London on your Placement Year.

The area I was based in had a variety of things to do, but undoubtedly the most interesting and exciting experiences were in Central London, which was just a short train journey away.

I was in a weekly 5-aside football team with some of the other people from IBM and other nearby companies which was really fun, and being this close to London there are always things to do there!