Technical Specialist Review

The internship was very engaging with plenty of work that was achievable despite my limited experience. Chose an 8 because even though the role I was given within the team was pretty much perfect in itself, I actually applied for an engineering internship. My internship was more inclined towards business and management and the business admits this but a slightly more technical placement would have been more suited to my background of study.

Colleagues were really helpful and took time to guide me through the weeks I was there. I was often praised for my achievements and given feedback on the work I’ve done. At the end of the placement a presentation day was help where all interns had the opportunity to present the work during the past 8 weeks and therefore get recognised.

I have found my manager to be extremely helpful. I am the first intern he has ever taken on but he's really excelled in keeping me busy and engaged with the work whilst also giving me the freedom to put my own spin on things. I feel that he's worked really well with me but I feel like everything will be a little bit smoother and a little bit more wholesome for the next intern he takes on. No major issues though.

Busy-ness varied depending on deadlines and point of time within the internship. There were some points where I had too little to do and needed to keep requesting work and there were other points where I felt that I was almost overrun. All in all the balance was good though with the extremes only tending to last for a couple of days at a time rather than being an ongoing issue.

I was given a huge amount of responsibility during my internship. The team of four that I joined very quickly became a team of two as two members took long term sick leave. This left a large void in the workload, a lot of which was handed to me to do. The work required regular interaction with our external customers and even resulted in me presenting some work to representatives from our government regulators within my first six weeks!

This is hard to judge as I am yet to fully see the effects of the internship on my personal development going forward. I have however had a lot more experience of interacting with a lot of people of different levels which has really helped me to expand my ability to communicate effectively. The discipline and work routine required with holding a job are both benefits that I will take forward with me in terms of managing my studies.

The National Grid Warwick office houses around 3,000 employees and so it can seem daunting seeing unfamiliar faces around the office every day. However, there are opportunities to attend events such as business awareness talks and sports clubs which allow you to network and meet people across the business. This ensures that all employees are made to feel valued and welcome. The office also has a hot desk policy and so it is easy to meet new people around the office which creates a good atmosphere.

The starting period was really poor. I was meant to start on the Monday but only found out at 5pm on the Friday that the company hadn't received all of my relevant work history information so couldn't let me start on the Monday. Through a very stressful Monday we managed to get all of the information and I stared on the Tuesday. I found it ridiculous that about 2-3 months after my offer, it took until the day before I was meant to start for them to alert me that my start date would change. This meant that my site induction was severely delayed, I had to alter the end date of my placement (as 12 weeks caused it to run until after the start of the new university term) and there were other issues regarding expense claims and access.

The company invested a lot in my personal development, especially considering that I was only working with the company for a period of 12 weeks. Most of the benefits of the training will only really be noticed in the future after the placement has finished but they chose to invest anyway. Lots of recent graduates and industrial placement students spent a lot of time with me informing me of all of the things they learnt during their time and how they would do things differently were they to start again with their current knowledge. All of this really helped my personal development and helped me to make the most of my limited time with the company.

As I'm typing this I'm waiting on a phone call regarding the graduate scheme. If I'm offered a place, I'll definitely take it. The people I've met, the work I've done, and the quality of the three placements I've been on have made the possibility of a future role at National Grid very appealing indeed.

Spending evenings and weekends with the other placement students really adds something to the placement experience. It was harder to do that this year, not being based in Warwick, but I still managed to see them occasionally. As there are fewer people in the Aztec West office, it's harder to get that same social aspect, but I did still go out for dinner with my managers, so it wasn't all bad.

The nearby towns are Warwick, Leamington Spa and Kenilworth which are all very upper class areas. This meant that the cost of living was extremely high. As a result, I decided to live further away from work and commute in. This meant that although my cost of living was a lot lower, I did have to spend a lot longer travelling and it made socialising quite a lot more difficult having to get the train in to go to events.

The night life pretty good in Leamington and there are lots of things to do and see with friends. Being close to two universities and the company having taken on a fair amount of undergraduates and graduates, it has been easy to meet people and develop relationships.There are a couple of clubs but Leamington is mainly good for its bars, which host live music near enough every weekend, and the bars are very close to each other so you won't have to taxi between them.So I imagine that it's alright.

Yes! At the beginning I was not too sure about what to do. However, the companies new employee's group called Newnet gets you involved in lots of activities outside your day job which allows you to meet new friends, volunteer and learn about different aspects of the business. I managed to make a reasonable number of friends during my internship but it was a long shot from blowing me away with the number of possibilities.