HR Partner Support Review

This placement year has been very enjoyable and exceeded my expectations. My role as HR Partner Support is very varied which has meant I have got involved in many projects. This has kept me interested and enabled exposure to many different experiences. I couldn't recommend this role and company more.

IBM HR is very inclusive and has a great community feel. I don't feel like an intern, they treat me like any other employee. I am able to offer support and advice to my colleagues as they respect my opinion. This has meant I was able to make a lasting contribution to the projects I have been involved in.

IBM offers a lot of support for the placement students. Firstly, my Early Professionals Manager has been very supportive and I have felt that I could tell her anything. She has given me great guidance in order to further my career and make the most of my time here. My Task Manager has also been very supportive and making sure that I get involved in the best opportunities possible.

As I mentioned before, my role is very varied. This means that I have been involved in multiple projects whilst also managing my day job. There have been times where I have been very busy and the day flies by but other times where I don't have much to do. This is very rare though and IBM has learning/badges that you can complete in these quieter times.

I was given a lot of responsibility. My day to day role involves dealing with confidential data regularly which they have full trust in me to have and use. I have also helped with presentations for the Country General Manager and the opportunity to work with the HR leader. This has been great exposure for me and made me feel valued.

I have learnt a lot about time management and the value of using the whole day to not waste any time. I will use the same routine when I go back to uni. My confidence has also improved massively which will help me in the future when applying for grad jobs or presenting.

The office I worked in was open plan so meant that there was always someone around and to talk to. We all work hard but stopped for the occasional gossip. Friday tended to be quieter due to people working from home but the office was more relaxed (they call it Friday Club).

It is very well set up and you can tell it's been running a long time. The process is very smooth with on boarding and training being very easy and informative. The support and information given on everything, including the intern to grad process, has been very good also. I felt like I belonged from day 1.

There's a lot of focus on employee skills and development. The push for this means there are plenty of resources to learn new skills. The 3, 6 and 12 month reviews allows you to reflect on what you've done and gain feedback for it. This is essential for development and so glad that IBM offers this.

The grad schemes are very good, I have applied for them myself. There is a separate one for HR which includes a summer project with a global team.

Yes! There were about 20 interns down in Portsmouth with most of us sharing houses together. It's just like uni but you're getting paid/working instead! We all made the effort to do things together at the weekends which was nice, I've made some great friends down here. The only thing we miss out down here is drinks after work (like they have in London).

Very affordable. Housing similar pricing to uni and being a student city means that it's cheap to go out etc!

Again, being a student city there are plenty of places to go out!

I was a bit disappointed that there weren't more sports clubs to get involved with. You could start your own but it's difficult if you don't already play sports. Would have liked to have picked something new up this year.