GTS Skills Developmental Analyst Review

It took a while to adjust to the working life when coming from university. I have enjoyed placement and have learned a lot from the experience. I now feel more confident in myself and feel better prepared for future life challenges and job interviews. Most people within IBM are friendly, team players, which makes for a good work environment, making placement more enjoyable.

My colleagues often acknowledged my contributions, which often helped to maintain my motivation.

While in IBM my managers were very supportive. They would always offer advice when asked and would tend to ask probing questions to provide me with direction but encourage me to think for myself. This helped me to develop and use my own initiative. IBM also give each placement student an Early Professionals Manager. Mine helped me to identify what I wanted to get from the year and helped me to maintain my focus in achieving my professional development objectives by reviewing them with me regularly. My EPM supported me in helping me to find opportunities to develop the skills I desired to improve upon.

Initially I was busy trying to get to grips with all the new information, acronyms, tools and methods used within IBM. As I became more comfortable in my role I became more efficient in my role. I then experienced quieter times. However, due to how vast IBM is there was numerous different projects I could get involved in, be it taking on more work or by giving back to the community. For example, helping to prepare school pupils and university students for interviews.

As placement went on my managers and others were more willing to allow me to take on more responsibility. At first, they gained an understanding of my abilities and then once this was established they allowed me to get involved and run my own projects. It was also partly down to me to use my own initiative and accept the responsibility I desired. I was able to make contributions to influence important business decision. Furthermore, in the latter months of my placement, I was given the responsibility to inform individuals if they had not been accepted for new job roles within the company.

The most transferable skills placement has helped me to improve is my time-management, confidence, communication and ability to understand that asking questions is positive and necessary to have a wide understand of the subject matter at hand. I have learned that it is important to have as broad a scope as you can before tackling any problem so that more reasoned decisions can be made. This agile way of thinking will help me within my final year at university in helping me to research as much as possible to have a clear understandings and thoughts when writing assignments. Additional, I also feel more self-aware and feel more able to deal with challenging situations and interviews. I have more appropriate experiences to provide evidence that I have skills sets useful for business roles. I now have a wider understanding of the scope of job roles available in the marketplace, which has helped me think about the direction of my future career.

Most of the time people in the office were upbeat, and willing to help. Sometimes the office was quiet as IBM allow a lot of employees to work from home which offers really good flexibility.

IBM has a large intern community so it runs pretty smoothly. There is lots of education to get involved in and the direction from EPMs really helps to support you in things running well, so that you can get the best out of your placement year.

As an intern, we had access to a wide pool of online education. We also had a careers academy day, helping to differentiate ourselves in the marketplace as well as gaining a better understanding of what is entailed for specific job roles. Some of the cost courses we were not allowed to participate in, but if you were accepted to return as a graduate there is scope to have a high personal development budget for education.

IBM is a good company to work for. They are very understanding and allow you to have the flexibility to work from home. Career progression within the company as a graduate is also good and they offer a competitive salary.

There is a large intern and graduate community within IBM to get involved in. It really depends on the year and how much you want to get involved. There are often roundtables that encourage strong communities.

The cost of living in Winchester is fairly high and you are not on a London wage. I would say a car is useful for the Hursley office.

None existent. Have to go to Southampton which is about 20 minutes away.