Quality Intern Review

Overall an enjoyable year that's really let me experience working life within a global organisation. Would have been improved had I been able to utilize and develop technical skills from my degree.

I did genuinely feel valued by members of the Quality Team, as well as my Manager, and I was well integrated into the team. Employees from different departments were a little more aloof, but friendly nonetheless.

I have been in day-to-day contact with my manager, and henceforth, receive advice and guidance as necessary. Other members of my team are always helpful and approachable. Since the mid-point of the year I've been having monthly 1-to-1 meetings with HR, which are useful, but would have been of greater benefit during the early stages of my placement.

I did always have tasks to complete, however some were more engaging and interesting than others - hence, some days were busy and stimulating, where as others seemed to drag a bit more due to some more medial tasks.

I was given a surprising level of responsibility - leading some high level projects, presenting to senior leadership, and even providing training sessions to large numbers of employees on site.

I've gained a range of transferable skills (which Eaton's Intern training days have helped), which I'm sure will be powerful both during the remainder of my studies, and beyond, into employment. I do wish however, that I'd been able to develop my technical engineering skills, as these are the skills which I wish to build my career around.

It was a pretty quiet office, which is useful when it comes to cracking on with work, but it can get a little dull from time to time - however, most of the people in that office are from different departments, and the atmosphere really varies from one office to another across the site.

Within the organisation, the internship is well organised and provisioned, and this is shown at the intern training events. Different sites are organised to different extents, and being one of the first 2 interns at the South Molton site, initially it felt as if information hadn't been fully flowed down to the site. This still remains the case, but to a lesser extent.

Eaton invested a lot of time and money organizing approximately 10 training events which bring all of the UK based Eaton Interns together. These events have been among the most memorable days of the year, and I feel like I've gained genuinely useful transferable skills and tools to help me on a day to day basis, along with developing my sense of self awareness and impact.

I certainly wouldn't rule out working for Eaton in the future, however, I'm wanting to experience work within different organisations so early in my working life. I'm currently looking into opportunities within research, such is my desire to pursue the technical aspects of engineering.

The majority of employees at my site were around 30 years my senior, so getting to know them wasn't so easy, seeing as I had more common ground with their children as opposed to them! That said, I did make some good connections, and consider myself friends with both employees from the site and other UK based interns.

It really was cheap, as expected in rural Devon - however, I'd rather rather pay a little extra and spend a year in a town/city with more going on.

Being in such a remote and small town such as South Molton does mean that it's devoid of anything resembling nightlife. Reallistically, the closest decent night out is in Exeter, so if you place any importance on this, you might want to live closer to Exeter (which is a good 40 minute drive from the site).

Not a vast amount of opportunities, so I took the opportunity to get back into running and I've competed in several races throughout the year, including a half marathon in Cardiff - so personally, it's been quite rewarding in that respect.