Undergraduate Research Student in Combustibles and Web & Publication Assistant Review

I enjoyed every single moment spent in this multinational company including the tough ones because they helped me growing. My roles kept me extremely busy on a daily basis but they never seemed to put me down because the environment was fabulous which made the work easier. I had interesting and challenging tasks…this is what I loved the most!

I felt valued most of the time especially in one of the departments. My ideas and suggestions were always taken into consideration. In some cases, I received requests from my teams asking for my opinion on certain areas / work. Everybody treated me as a mature employee and this made me feel I was contributing to the company.

Coming into a new world was exciting but worrying at the same time. Fortunately, I only felt nervous during the first couple of hours on the first day. This is because my line managers and the teams showed me their willingness to help me at any time. They were never too busy for a catch up meeting or a quick clarification on something. I was given a lot of support since the start of my journey. People also outside my departments were always very happy to meet for a coffee and tell me about their career.

I must say that there was not a single day where I did not have any work to carry out. I was always busy but I consider it as an advantage because I was never bored. At the end of some days I was feeling exhausted but I think it is normal as long as it does not happen every day.

I held a lot of responsibilities especially in one of the departments where I was driving the project and I was the only person working on that topic. I never thought I was going to have such responsibilities in a company like BAT. I would have been more than happy to have more and bigger responsibilities.

Spending 12 months at BAT has helped me becoming a more open and confident person. I have also noticed a change in the way I approach my studies since I am working full-time and studying for my MChem degree at the same time. The opportunities that BAT gave me including contacting and visiting external suppliers, participating to important meetings and organising a conference helped me to interact more and take initiatives.

The office environment was friendly. People focused on their work but it did not mean we could not have a laugh together.

Overall, the work I was assigned was well organised. We encoutered a couple of obstacles in the course of the placement but we successfully overcame them. My line managers took care of me and they always ensured that I was participating in different work/events and obtaining the most out of them.

The company invested a lot of time and money in me. I received both internal and external training in order to carry out my research and interact with people outside the company. I was also lucky to travel to Austria to visit one of our suppliers, present my project and receive personal training. The relationship with them grew further with time. Other trainings included the use of a statistical software.

Definitely very appealing. There is a high percentage of employees who started working at BAT at a young age as undergraduate placement students and rejoined the company after the completion of their degree. This showed that they enjoyed the work environment and the type of tasks they were involved in.

One of the teams I was working with used to organise informal team lunch / dinner every 2-3 months. We were also very active to be involved in activities outside of work such as bowling, sailing, go-karting. It was a great time to bond with the rest of the team and know more about everyone else apart from the job.

It was fairly within the average.

Overall, it was average. There were no exciting places to go to.

There was a good amount of activities and things to visit around this area especially when the weather permitted us to get involved in something different. These included shopping, eating out, bowling, laser tag, water activities, parks, visit to the Isle of Wight, New Forest, Bournemouth and other nearby cities