Marketing Assistant Review

Overall, I have enjoyed my placement at 3M mainly due to the amount of responsibility I was given. I led the launch of a new product range and carried out analysis for the reasons to launch, I managed and led my team when launching the new road safety website and also managed all marketing activity for a set group of products. At times, I found it difficult to apply knowledge from my university studies to my placement year which was frustrating and feel that the changes within the division negatively impacted at times my enthusiasm for the role.

I did feel very valued by my colleagues during my time at 3M. I would be invited to attend customer and distributor meetings with our sales team to develop my communication skills and business knowledge. I was also regularly invited to 'pub lunch Friday' which made me feel like an actual employee and part of the team! I feel that this is a strength of 3M and that there are always people who will listen to your queries and want to make you feel at ease - at the end of the day you are working here for a whole year so you want to feel valued.

During my time at 3M I experienced a range of managers and styles of leadership due to changes in roles, acquisitions of smaller 3M business and so on. For those reasons, at times I have experienced very little support and guidance from management. Overall, however I have always had someone to ask questions to and review work I need to complete. I feel that my last manager was particularly encouraging and able to support and guide my work wherever it was needed.

During the year I have experienced a range of busy and not so busy periods. Overall, however I would agree that it was the perfect balance. I had enough work to keep me engaged on a daily basis and there were always other projects I could be involved in if I ran out of things to do (which never happened!) Contrastingly, I also feel that there wasn't too much work that made the job stressful. I feel that a placement year should be an opportunity to try new things, develop skills and be involved in a range of tasks. From this, I feel that a placement student should not be stressed at work. 3M helped me to manage tasks and my workload and ensure that I wasn't stressed about tasks to complete.

I was given so much responsibility in my placement; something I did not expect at all being 'only' a placement student. At first I was apprehensive about having so much responsibility but this was something I adapted to and my manager was able to support me with. Within my division I was treated as just another marketing employee and was given a full range of responsibilities. I led the launch of a new product range and carried out all market analysis to support my recommendations, generated new pricing based on costs and desired profit margins and created sales strategies for the sales team to follow and launched the new website for our division.

I have developed a broad range of skills that I will be able to apply to my final year at university. Being an International Business student I was concerned that I did not have enough marketing knowledge for my course. I quickly learnt about new marketing frameworks and feel that real life experience will benefit me in marketing-related final year modules. I have developed my presentation and communication skills immensely whilst at 3M and feel that this will allow me to present more confidently in my final year. I will also be completing a final year project based on the new product range I launched - with first hand experience in this project I hope to succeed in this unit. I also received training during my time at 3M such as 'personal branding' and Linked In to improve my professional profile for when I am applying for graduate roles. I did hope to be involved in more marketing campaigns, which I feel would have benefited me in advertising-related modules in my final year, however I feel that this is the nature of a B2B marketing role.

The general atmosphere of the office was overall cheery, however at times when negative announcements were discussed, people would be quiet. We did have a lot of fun however, we created a Christmas tree in December together and went for regular pub lunches and team breakfasts! Everyone in the office is also very relaxed but motivated to work and are always happy to help. I feel that the atmosphere was a perfect mix between motivated and fun.

There were factors outside of my control that meant that at times my placement wasn't as organised, such as changes to management. Overall, however, my placement was organised with the projects that I was initially given when I started at 3M. I was given an opportunity to agree on what projects I would like to manage and was given a broad range of goals that my manager wanted me to meet during the first month.

I attended a few training development workshops throughout the year which did teach me valuable skills such as presentation skills and knowledge of how to improve my CV and Linked In profile. I was allowed to go to external shows and events throughout my placement year which allowed me to understand the market and customers I was working with. I did not expect to be given such broad range of development programs and tasks.

I feel that there is a lot of ambiguity around the structure of 3M in the future and feel that though I would like the offer to return to 3M, there may not be a graduate opportunity available. I do feel however that because of the vast size of the company, that there is a higher opportunity that I will be able to return to the company in a complete different role, for example digital marketing team or even globally. I have noticed that many of the leadership employees who currently work at 3M started off as placement students.

We began the placement year as a big 'student group' and sat with each other at lunch which was nice as we were able to discuss our different roles. Overall, I have become really good friends with some of the placement students who lived near me in Reading and feel that this was a true positive to come out of my year at 3M. During the year, we have organised nights out and BBQs to socialise outside of work. However, I feel that I have equally be involved in a range of social events with my division. Some of my team colleagues were a similar age to me and so we regularly went out for lunchs and had lots of fun at the work Christmas party at Ascot Race Course!

Though I worked in Bracknell, I lived in Reading. Reading overall is very expensive in terms of rented accommodation compared to my usual university monthly rent which was a shame and typically the nightlife can be expensive as it is near to London. Socialising in Bracknell seemed to be cheaper and pub lunches would come to no more than £10 each. I feel that putting it into perspective, there are a lot of ways you can spend money during your placement year but also ways to save!

Bracknell has very few (if any!) bars and clubs however living in Reading allowed me to go to a range of restaurants, bars and clubs in the evening. Bars in Reading especially are a big positive of working at 3M as there was loads of them making it a perfect place to go with friends who came to visit me. Nightlife in the surrounding areas as well were great - with only 20 minute train into London, it made it easier to spend a night out there.

Other than the social events as discussed, I also joined the 3M Netball team which played in Reading for fun every Monday - although if you do want to join, wrap up warm as play months were right through Winter! Within 3M there are also a range of sports clubs to join such as rugby and football and I'm sure you can create your own club too. I spent lots of time with colleagues outside of work which was fun.