Environmental Advisor Review

I thoroughly enjoyed the placement. Both the personal and professional aspects were enjoyable. On a personal level, Centrica provided me with accommodation, a company car and a good wage. Professionally, I learnt a lot from my first experience in the corporate world and would highly recommend the placement to anyone interested in HSES/ The energy industry.

I felt extremely valued by my colleagues. I wasn't treated like a mentee or intern, but like a colleague, which I didn't think I would have been! The only time when I was treated like an intern was during meetings with my manager, but that was appropriate! So yeah, I felt very valued by my colleagues who were all really nice!

To a significantly high extent I have been given support and guidance by my manager. Throughout the placement, it has been a good balance between management, and leaving me alone to complete my tasks. At the start of the internship, my 4 objectives were outlined by my manager, and he stated numerous times that at any point during my internship he would happily support me in achieving my objectives.

On most days I was relatively busy, it never got overly busy though, but a good balance. However, towards the end of my placement, when I started to achieve my objectives, I started having less to do everyday, so ended up finding things for myself to do to keep myself busy.

I was given full responsibility of 4 projects. The first was the completion of a set of audits; the second was creation of an intranet web page; the third was the creation of a intricate flow chart; fourth, I had to close out a previous audits' findings. I didn't expect to be given as much responsibility as I have been!

The skills I've developed will 100% assist me beyond my degree. They won't benefit my degree as much, but I feel at a significant advantage post-degree, having gained the corporate experience with a FTSE 100 company that I have done. The corporate experience I've gained during the placement is invaluable.

The general office atmosphere was extremely relaxed. I was based in Hessle, Hull - and before I arrived in Hull, everyone in Head office stated that the Hessle office was stricter and more corporate than the Windsor offices - this turned out to be false! Everyone was lovely, and there's a very relaxed atmosphere - dress down Fridays too!

Surprisingly well organised! Upon arrival to my induction, I was informed that I was the first summer placement intern in HSES that Hull had had, so I was prepared for a slightly unorganised visit, I also thought that my colleagues may not have had time for me. I was wrong! It'd been organised and set up extremely well, and all my colleagues were very welcoming.

I felt the company invested a lot in me. They paid for myself, and the other summer interns, to do a CATCH engineering training day, which was a very good experience. In addition to this, all my colleagues happily invested many hours of their time into helping me achieve my objectives!

Future employment prospects with Centrica are immensely appealing. One of my favourite aspects of the role was working flexi time. You obviously had to work for a set time period, but you could alter when you do that, so today, I need to leave work early to get a train, so I'm working 7-3, I don't feel like you get this flexibility elsewhere. The firm is extremely successful and a great place to work; with the benefits included too, I'd very much like to work here in the future.

There was! There's 5 interns all up in Hull, 4 of which are engineers, and then there's me. We all live together in private student accommodation in the centre of Hull, which is very nice actually, so we organise our own events in the evening. This usually entails a trip to the pub.

Cost of living was extremely cheap - accommodation and the company car costs are covered by Centrica, so you just had to pay for food really. There's a Lidl just down the road from the offices, so it's easy to eat on a budget! Socialising in the area was cheap too, with pints being pretty reasonably priced!

Nightlife in the area was very good. Where our accommodation was there was a pub directly opposite, on the other side of the street. And about a minute round the corner there was a 'Spoons, so we went short of pubs. There's a couple of clubs in town too, only been to Atik, but it was okay.

There was plenty of opportunities to get involved in activities outside of work. Corporate wise, there was opportunities to raise money for the charity partner, so could get involved in charity events outside of work. Then socially, outside of work, there was a lot of opportunities to get involved in activities too.