Continous Improvment Placement Student Review

I have thoroughly enjoyed my placement at Bournville with Mondelez International. The work has been engaging and challenging, and has allowed me to make a real difference to the business in my time here (that I have been able to see the results of). The working environment is friendly and fun, whilst maintaining a strong focus on safety.

Managers and leaders throughout the business were generally willing to help and answer questions. They were quick to recognise your skill set and would praise good work, making you feel like your work had made a big difference to their section. Operators and technicians were harder to get a positive reaction out of, at first, but one of the challenges of this placement was getting operators on your side so that by the end of the placement you had become a part of the team.

My line manager was very helpful and would always answer questions or suggest others who may be able to help with any particular problems. We had weekly meetings to review progress, and although it was made clear that I was expected to stand on my own two feet, made me feel like I could bring up any concerns over the role I was in, or any problems I was experiencing. Unfortunately, due to the nature of my line manager's job, she was not always available, and some weekly meetings had to be missed due to other responsibilities. The management team were also very helpful in giving answers, but would not always follow through on helping with actions that you couldn't push through by yourself. Nevertheless, I feel like this is to do with the nature of the job and the environment of working in a factory, where daily challenges can pull you away from planned work at any time.

As with any job, some days were much busier than others. A lot of the time I was expected to find work for myself, by involving myself within various teams and thus was able to choose the projects that I worked on - this was good, because I got to work on the projects that interested me most, but meant that there were times when you found yourself without a lot to do. Most of the time I had enough to get on with to not feel bored, and sometimes I had so much to get through that the day didn't seem long enough - I felt there was a good balance to the workload, on the most part.

I was given 3 main projects to focus on throughout my placement, as well as any additional work that I chose to pick up. Two of these projects were individually led, and one was co-led with a fellow intern, this gave me lots of responsibility to keep to my own deadlines, organise my own work, and set my own goals. One of these projects caused me to take over a role from one of my colleagues, who later left the business, so I carried on this role until the end of my placement at which point I was responsible for the handover of the task to another employee - this task was vital to higher level management within the business, so it was vital to get the figures right and produced on time. Overall, I feel I was respected as a placement student, given important work to do that made an actual difference to the business, and got to work closely with high level management teams.

The reason I have only given a 6 for this placement is because the placement did not include as many opportunities to use technical knowledge as I originally expected. Thus, I feel that this placement does not assist me as much in my further degree studies as it could have. Nevertheless, I have gained valuable experiences in my time here. I have improved communication skills by learning to encourage operator involvement into projects, I have better team management and team participation skills. I have had the opportunity to develop some technical knowledge based on the tempering of chocolate which I have found very interesting and was the one area where I was able to develop skills learned so far in my degree. I have been trained in LEAN tools and the statistical tools involved in a SixSigma Green Belt project, which will be valuable experience to talk about at interviews, and a credit on my CV. I feel the personal skills that I have developed will help me in how I set out my studying for the final two years of my degree, even if I have not been able to add as much to my technical skillset as I originally hoped.

The office has a good balance of friendly fun and hard work. As an open plan office, it's an easy environment to ask questions, introduce yourself to people who you've been advised to talk to etc. I got to know the people on the desks nearest to me enough to have some friendly jokes going around. There are frequent offerings in the coffee bar, either of WIP product or cake for someone's birthday. At the same time, the office is relatively quiet and it's easy to get on and work. In the factory it is sometimes harder to get to know people because of the noise and the level of activity going on. Nevertheless, the operators are friendly and willing to have a laugh once you get to know them.

The placement started out with some clearly given goals, and 3 projects to complete. The training given for these projects was relatively well organised. However, one of these projects was supposed to be finished by January (having started in these particular projects in October) so that a second project could be carried out for the remainder of the placement - this was aimed at giving us two chances at a Green Belt accreditation. As the projects went on it became clear that the solutions to the problems were not going to be easy to implement, therefore the second project was scrapped giving us only one chance at accreditation and meaning some of the interns may not get accredited. It should've been clear to the management that the scale of the projects was too large for a 4 month schedule.

I feel the company went beyond what they needed to in terms of training, and therefore they have invested in me as a person and allowed me to develop here more than some other companies might have. As well as the health and safety, food safety, and good manufacturing procedures training that was required for work within the factory, we were also trained in LEAN tools, the 12-Step Kaizen process, and Six Sigma Green Belt which may lead to a Green Belt accreditation. Once trained, these extra tools were developed and used within the factory environment. Several personality type and learning type discussions also took place, which were useful for personal development of working style and team management styles.

This depends entirely on whether or not I decide to pursue a career in the food industry. If I do decide on the food industry, I will definitely be applying for the Mondelez International graduate scheme as I have been both encouraged and challenged to grow here as a person, I feel it would be a great place to continue developing as a Graduate. I just haven't decided what industry I want to focus on after my degree.

There were 9 placement students in my department, and 16 placement students at Bournville in total. Many of the other interns lived together in groups (As a student at the University of Birmingham I chose to live with other university students), this led to a good friendship between the interns. Many of us ate lunch together on a regular basis, and weekend events were regularly organised. We also had a bowling / curry night within our department to celebrate the successes of some of our projects just under halfway through the placement, and had a Christmas Party organised by the business, held at the ICC in Birmingham.

Originally coming from the South, fairly close to London, most things in Birmingham seem very reasonably priced. There are lots of houses available in Selly Oak, as this is the main student village for the University of Birmingham. This accommodation varies in quality and cost, but is generally cheaper the further away from the university campus (which means closer to Bournville site, conveniently). Selly Oak has a large selection of take-away restaurants, some good pubs, and a handful of supermarkets from Co-Op to Aldi.

I am not big on big nights out, so my opinion is largely based on what I hear from the other placement students. As well as the local pubs in Selly Oak and Harborne, the large majority of which serve decent food and cheap drinks, there's lots going on in the city centre. There are large clubs on Broad Street, as well as pubs, cocktail bars, cinema, trampoline park, mini golf etc. across the city. Most of this is accessible by train.

Weekend activities were often organised amongst the interns. Some charitable events were organised by colleagues, however, the majority of charity work and community engagement was arranged by the company - such as sponsored bike rides and cake sales. As a large city, I'm sure there are lots of groups and things that you could get involved in if you knew what you were looking for. The University of Birmingham's Guild of Students (aka. student union) has the most societies of any uni in the UK at the moment, non-students can join these societies for a slightly higher fee than student members (£4-10 for the year).