HR - Early Talent Review

I thoroughly enjoyed my placement year at GSK within the Early Talent area of HR. The placement was flexible to my needs, allowed me to venture into different areas to explore the best position for my future, gave me accountability with large projects and was supportive during applications for the graduate schemes. The people at GSK and in HR are fantastic, everyone is very helpful and supportive of your development.

My close team, extended team and others within GSK have been extremely supportive through every working task, they have been happy to offer help during tough projects, have been significantly supportive during each step of my development and have given trust in the work that I have been doing and I have been able to trust the team in providing honest feedback.

I was given extensive support from my manager. I expressed my interest in other areas of the business and she assisted me to begin networking in the organisation and was supportive for me to work part time within my placement and part time working on projects in a different area of the business. We conducted regular catch ups to ensure that I was on task with my projects and request any support or guidance.

On most days, I was relatively busy. I was stretched enough while not being overworked. However, there were peaks and troughs. One of my projects was assisting with a large event which required long days to ensure the work was completed in peak periods. Although, other days, there is less work to be doing and then I was sure to be proactive and seek out more work.

I was given lots of responsibility, presenting at campus events like (London Business School, Cambridge and Oxford), engaged in high profile projects, acted as cover for my manager while she was out on holiday with great support and encouragement.

I would definitely say that the skills I gained were very important for future careers with skill development in communication, networking, teamwork and many other important soft skills. Additionally, skills for university like organisation, project management and group work will definitely be improved due to my placement year.

Some days it can be quite energetic with many other placement students in the function, however, HR as an office is not the most energetic function. However, from my experience within the Consumer Healthcare function, there is a lot more energy, fun and social interaction with the teams.

My placement was very structured. From the first week, I was explained my projects for the year and set objectives with my manager for my personal development and professional projects. The year went to plan with more projects included further down the line, however, these were also well integrated into my placement development.

I had expressed an interest into the Consumer Healthcare sales and marketing function and my manager and team were all supportive for me to explore the area and allow me to work part time on my HR placement to explore the other areas for my development. Additionally, I applied for graduate schemes where my team, extended team and recruitment were all amazingly helpful to get me ready for the assessment centres and applications.

There are many routes back into GSK. They have a graduate scheme called the Future Leaders Programme(FLP), to which placement students are fast tracked through the online test phase as we had already completed this for our placement applications. Further to the FLP, there are other graduate schemes within areas like Consumer Healthcare, but also direct entry into the company after. This is where making a large network within your chosen function is very helpful for updates and contacts.

Yes, there was a large number of placement students within HR so there were frequent visits to the local pub and other organised nights out mid week and weekends.

The Brentford area isn't very expensive for socialising or cost of living, but isn't cheap. It is about standard for London. I personally lived at home and commuted, however, I know many students who paid roughly £700 per month in rent.

There are a few pubs locally, however, if you would like a good night out you had to travel into London.

There were some opportunities, but these were mostly team organised or organised by IP Unite (the placement society) creating events and nights out but they were not massively popular, despite being a good opportunity to meet other placement students.