BP Shadow day Review

I really enjoyed the BP shadow day. I felt like the graduates running it were very friendly and informative. I was provided with a good overview of what a world leading oil and gas company does and I can say it has successfully drawn me towards working in such industry in the future.

I can't really say I felt very valued. It felt like the experience was more for us to value the shadow day and the company, rather than for the company to value us as potential applicants. It didn't feel very personal as there were about 6 students and 2 graduates. Maybe could've felt more personal if it was smaller groups of students.

The graduates running the programme were quite thorough in every thing they explained so I did not feel as though I needed support or guidance from them. However any questions I did have were well answered. They did explain the application process in depth however so I feel like I've received some good guidance when it comes to my time to apply.

I felt as though the knowledge and experience I gained was very valuable to my degree, and valuable to me deciding what career path to take. My degree course involves a year in industry and I feel like the shadow day has given me a good idea of what working in industry would be like and now I am even more motivated to gain an industrial placement.

Most of the individual sessions were quite good. Some felt a little out of place but generally the structure was fine. I did feel it could've been a little bit better well planned. The thing I was looking forward to the most, a random member of staff was assigned to deliver it spontaneously so he did not have much idea about it so it wasn't as good as it should've been.

I quite enjoyed the atmosphere. It felt very professional, especially seeing groups of staff in meeting rooms working on projects together and discussing progress and giving feedback to each other. It made me realise that it was a great atmosphere to work in and it is something I would be happy to experience at a company like BP.

The company did not invest in us very much. As I mentioned earlier, the day was more for us, students, to find out about the company and what they do, rather than to train us for anything. They did however do some teaching of how oils and lubricants work in an engine so I guess they invested teaching resources into us.

I'd say to a good extent. I found out that the company is structured in a way that there are small groups of staff, at the Castrol centre it was chemists and engineers, which work together and try to innovate new products for the next year of BP. They have frequent meetings where they assign roles and share feedback.

I'd say it helped me quite well, but half a day is not enough to fully immerse yourself in what the company do. We were told what happens from the outside but we didn't have the opportunity to actually be involved and experience it for ourselves. Rating would be higher if there was more involvement of the students.

I felt it was quite valuable because prior to the day I did not know anything about oil, lubricants or engines. I was actually quite intimidated by the subject of engingeering but the day made me realise it is actually really cool and I have now been investing time to teach myself simple engineering which will hopefully be of use sometime in the future.

the opportunity was not paid. I am to be reimbursed for my travels, but I have not yet received this.

There were not really any opportunities. There was a set schedule which included stuff like an introductory session where we found out about the graduate students but there wasn't anything planned for us to get to know the other students or meet other employees at BP. It would've been good to meet chemists at BP.

There wasn't really the opportunity for this. We met with some staff briefly in the office and had a small educational session by two other students on the graduate schemes but we didn't really have the chance to speak with fellow students or to speak to staff which were not the graduates.

yes, the graduates explained this to us very well. I found out that they have a gym that staff can access free of charge, and also bonuses they can get like vouchers, holiday days off or they can exchange these bonuses for a lump sum of money. The employees are also allowed to work from home with reasonable frequency which is very convenient.

I would very much recommend it if they are interested in chemistry or engineering.