Software Engineer Summer Intern Review

The staff were all really friendly and welcoming. They were willing to arrange time to talk with me about their work eve though I was only there for a short amount of time so I felt like I mattered. My main work task was not very interesting and I don't think it contributed anything useful to the team.

My colleagues were all really nice and welcoming and would chat with me when I came in each morning. However, because I wasn't going to be there for that long, and because they were always very busy, I couldn't learn how to take part in the work they actually did. While there were tools that I did learn to use, I often didn't have permission to actually do anything with them.

My manager often checked up on how I was doing and we had a weekly one-to-one to discuss what I had done the previous week, what I was planning to do this week and if there were any areas that I wanted further support from. If I needed help, my manager and my mentor often suggested people to talk to in that specific area and CC'd them on emails.

I had a decent amount of work to do but I don't feel like I was pushed. When I mentioned this I was given small tasks to do but I don't think they really pushed me or taught me much. That said, it did give me a lot of time to network and learn about other roles within the company which was useful.

I didn't have permission to use a lot of the tools my team used so I couldn't impact their work directly. The word I did was parallel to my team, so if anything went wrong it didn't have any effect on my team's work, which was good, but meant that I didn't really have any pressure - I would have like more responsibility.

My python has improved a lot - this will be useful for taking tests for assessment centres and for some work in my degree (but we don't cod in python that much). I think it improved my networking skills - I don't feel worried about emailing and meeting up with people I have never met before. I'm confident that I will have something good to talk to them about.

It was really friendly and most people were happy to chat a bit in the morning. However, a lot of the time people all had headsets on so you couldn't talk to them.

We were told to set targets and then had official check ups on these targets - this kept me focused and when things went wrong beyond my control, these targets could be changed and adapted. We had social events organised throughout which was nice.

We were given access to online training - however, in my opinion a lot of it is nowhere near as good as some youtube tutorials but we couldn't access youtube internally. I went to some python classes which were useful to know who to ask for help but were pretty unproductive.

I got offered a follow-up placement which was what I wanted. I know there is a large range of work which varies depending on location so I'm looking forward to being able to do a range of work within a company which has a friendly atmosphere.

Most people were friendly and happy to sit and chat at lunch. Some people were definitely a bit competitive about the internship but most people were really nice.

Compared to London, food and drinks were cheap. Accommodation was expensive - I chose to stay in student halls and most of these are aimed at international students so often cost more. Other people found cheaper places though.

There were a couple of clubs and some bars. A lot of the bars had mainly older adults though as all the uni students were home for summer, so it was a bit awkward at times.

There were a few sports clubs - I played some badminton. However, a lot of the staff in Bournemouth are older and have kids so there weren't as many social things going on as I thought there would be. Most of the interns met up often which was nice.