SMB Sales Operations Assistant Review

I enjoyed most days very much, I often faced quite a few different challenges throughout the week, and was given a lot of freedom to develop myself, and work on things I wanted to work on. The reason I have not rated higher is that there was some repetitiveness in the job, and it could get a bit mundane.

I felt extremely valued, I was always given my chance to speak and develop ideas, and I was often listened to. My colleagues took me very seriously from the start and treated me like a full-time employee, and from this I was given a lot of responsibility, and asked to help with many aspects of the business unit.

It was a mixture of both here, my deployment manager was not particular good in this area, and we rarely spoke about how my placement was going. However, the people I worked with day in day out in the business unit were very supportive, especially my supervisor. It was also very nice to have such supportive executives who for the little amount of time they had would also help me.

In my job I had some days that were busier than others, but generally I wasn't asked to do too much or too little. I was given quite a lot of freedom in my job, so a lot of the time it was up to me to make the most of my time, which I was quite good at, but other could have struggled and got bored. It was also the case some days when I was very busy, but in eyes that's a good thing because the day goes a lot quicker.

As already said I was given a lot of responsibility. I was often the leader of many operational projects, and from day one I was responsible for a lot of work and information that had to be delivered.

I would say that I developed a serious amount of skills during my year, but they often were from specific training schemes, more the day in the day out work I did. I did learn a lot around using systems, and office programmes, and my people and presenting skills improved dramatically. But this was down to being set challenging tasks by managers rather than being sent on training programmes.

I was in sales operations, and to be honest it was a bit dull, there weren't that many characters. I really enjoyed the students I worked with, and am still good friends. There were a couple of team events, but there wasn't much comeraderie in the office.

IBM were not particularly good at this part of the scheme. When I joined it took me a week to get a laptop to work on, when I was meant to have it the day I arrived. It also took a similar amount of time to set it up with correct access, all being done by my previous student too. IBM also didn't organise any nights out, or initiation days so it was difficult to get to know the other students at the start.

They had a lot of online rersource avalible to learn from, but most of the training came from small sessions with co-workers.

There are good opportunities to go back to the company, and they do complete assessment days just for current placement students so you get in ahead of the rest of the applicants. But the process is flawed, as they do not take into account you years work, and only just whether your good enough for the graduate scheme based on a half day assessment in your office. I do know of quite a few who have gone back, but I'm actually off to Accenture, so read into that what you will.

Most students got on, and it was like being at uni but with a 9-5 due to large amounts of students. However IBM did not facilitate any of this, and did nothing themselves to encourage social interactions.

I was paid enough to get by, and save a little each month. Where I lived wasn't cheap, £400 per month rent (but a nice house), and it's generally fairly expensive. But I managed to do most things I wanted to, and came out of the year about £500 up.

Staines - poor! A few decent bars, but that was about it, a cinema too. Good shops though. The surrounding area was nice, but as far as nights out you would always have to travel which is a pain. But richmond, kingston and windsor are decent nights out, cost a bit though.

The students organised football 5 and 11 a side games, but these weren't done though IBM. Because of the large group of students though, there was often things going on.