Environment Health and Safety Industrial Placement Review

I thoroughly enjoyed my year at GSK, my work was varied and engaging and has helped me understand what a career in environmental science may look like. I felt I was a valued member of the department and whilst some of my work was challenging, I always felt as I had the support and resource of my department to help me complete any task set to me.

I felt extremely valued by my colleagues, I think I was fortunate in that my department were used to having a student and so understood my capabilities. There were a number of tasks that I carried out individually that greatly helped out the team and I received a lot of positive feedback and thanks over the course of the year.

My line manager gave me constant support, and whilst he did challenge me there was always an understanding that he would always be able to help out. Beyond my line manager other colleagues were very supportive and keen to use their experience to help to teach me and I greatly benefitted from their expertise.

At the beginning of the year I was relatively quiet, there was little work to do beyond some smaller projects which were handed over to me from the previous student. My role did not have many day to day responsibilities like may lab roles would have so there were days where I was very quiet. After Christmas my workload picked up significantly as I got involved with more and more larger projects and this remained constant until summer. My last few weeks in August were quiet due to colleagues taking holidays and many project tapering off.

I was given a good amount of responsibility, I chaired committees on site and also acted as the lead co-ordinator for site wide events. I felt my line manager and department as a whole trusted me and my judgement and I often acted as my managers delegate when he could not make meetings etc.

I think all the skills I have developed over the year (written, verbal communication, time management, organisation, audit training etc etc) will prove invaluable in my career in the Environmental sector and I feel confident I will be more capable than peers who opted out of a year in industry.

Good atmosphere in the office, I spoke with all of my department and felt I got on well with the majority of them. The general atmosphere was quite relaxed and colleagues often discussed their lives outside of work which was a nice change of pace. My office was open plan which helped the atmosphere, I sometimes worked at a different site and these offices were separate and far more formal.

Very well organised, it was obvious that this was a placement scheme that had been going on for a while as my onboarding was very easy and any questions I had were easily answered. There were a couple of issues with late payment, but this was primarily due to the time sheet website. Things like a handover period were obviously thought about and helped me to settle in.

Not many opportunities for personal training and development, I went on one external training course which was a fire safety/awareness course but the rest of my training was all via a training website in the form of presentations/seminars. I attened a few in house training sessions such as CV improvement and personal skills but did not get much benefit from these courses. During one week of placement my whole department were on an external training course and I was left off of it due to expense.

This was probably the area I was most disappointed about. GSK run a graduate scheme within my department which I was very keen to apply for, I made this apparent from the start and built a working relationship with a number of current and alumni grads. When the applications opened I had to complete the full online assessment which I had already passed for the internship, which was an inconvenience but sort of understandable and I was also able to attach a personal reference from my line manager. My line manager wrote me a very positive reference and I was told I had been shortlisted for the assessment centre. I then heard nothing for 3-4 weeks and it transpires the department were not taking onboard any more grads for the foreseeable future due to reorganisation. This was extremely disappointing as I had spent so long on the application process as it was something I was very interested in, I felt this wasn't handled very professionally by GSK and was a waste of my time.

The other students went out quite a lot however I lived in a different area to the majority of the students, so I did not attend as many of these events as I could have. I was relatively close to London so I spent more time in London with some friends from home. I would recommend living near the other students as it is far easier to go out.

Slightly cheaper than London prices for both rent and food/drinks but not massively. Rent is still quite expensive when considering the wage and is somewhat hard to find as the surrounding areas are expecting family houses and not student house. No relocation money on starting and deposits, rent, moving costs soon add up.

Ware had a few nice pubs but Hertfordshire was the nearest area for clubs/bars. Pretty small selection, but okay for the year or so you are here. London is only a train ride away so there are other options if you get bored of the same handful of pubs and same faces.

I did not get involved in many activities outside of work, so I can't really comment on this. There is the sports and social club which runs 5 a side football, canoeing sessions etc. There isn't much in Ware outside of this but there is more stuff in Hertfordshire and Stevenage.