DMS Project Coordinator Review

The work I was given to do was challenging and rewarding. It initially felt overwhelming, but as I grew into the role I began to understand the context of the work I was doing and gather a clearer idea of the processes required to complete tasks. When reflecting on my placement year, I am immensely proud of the work I have completed, having been given deliverables I had never expected to be trusted with. I have learnt how to operate new programmes & systems and gained a tremendous insight into the automotive industry.

Regular review meetings with my line manager and collaboration between my project workstream made me really feel part of a team

Support was always available when needed. It was very good to always have somebody who could give you a steer on a task

As clichéd and unbelievable as it sounds, every day was truly different on the DMS Project. There were some days where the workload was very heavy and days where the workload was much lighter and more manageable. I have been led to believe this is standard for a project of this size

Whilst always able to ask for help & guidance, I was trusted to undertake key project deliverables by myself; including agency briefing, process creation and corporate identity implementation.

Skills learned this year will play a part in my degree, as ways of managing my workload became much clearer. They will be more prevalent in a future career - my placement has given me a much clearer idea of what I would like to do following university and given me the transferable skills to take into those roles.

The CORE team were an exceptional group of people, all willing to offer support in a friendly manner. As appears common on projects and in large corporations, internal politics did affect the atmosphere on occasion. The emissions issue also had an impact on the office and it was very interesting to see the effect such a large global news story affects a company internally.

Initially, it was passed to me to choose the area I would like to enter, as the project covered 4 distinct functional areas; Sales, Marketing, Accounting & Aftersales. From that perspective, it could have been better set up as other undergraduates had more clearly defined roles to step into. Despite that, as the project evolved during my time on it, I was given important deliverables and began to work primarily for the Retailer Engagement workstream, where weekly meetings ensured we all had a clear idea of where we were and next step plans.

I was able to go on a number of training courses at the company. I also attended department away days which involved team challenges and tasks.

VWG UK offer an exceptional graduate scheme and those on a placement with them can be 'fast-tracked' to the assessment centre stage if they pass a suitability interview.

I was forutunate to get a very reasonable rent. Socialising was quite expensive

With no university, Milton Keynes only really has a small handful of bars and clubs. The drinks and entry are also more expensive than your typical uni towns/cities London is only 30 mins away on the train however, so there is that as an option