Software Engineering Intern Review

The whole experience was great and actually went by quite quickly. It took a little to get used to the online environment, but eventually it did not prevent me from enjoying the internship. I was often quite excited about what was to come, and by the end I felt quite nostalgic about leaving. We even ended up with a team social where we wrote cheesy things about each other. Overall, the only thing I longed for a bit more was technical challenges.

We worked in a team of 7 with 2 supervisors, and we were given a lot of independence so that was great. We got to decide where we wanted to take our project and fully take responsibility for it. This allowed for some creativity and the flexibility to accomodate the needs of everyone in the team. Management and our supervisors also valued our work and were willing to put us in touch, and show us around.

My direct supervisor was fantastic and still keep in touch with him. He was always super keen on following our project and providing guidance without getting in the way. More importantly, you could tell he really enjoyed working with the interns. He even got us a few meetings with senior people to network, get to know some projects and also present our own. My direct manager was also very nice and has given me some great feedback.

Early on we were a bit too busy with multiple different activities going on besides our main project like challenges, mandatory training and talks and other sessions. However it got better as we gave some feedback that it was taking time away from us focusing on our main project. The last few weeks were a bit more hectic as we wanted to get our project done on time to present it before leaving, but it was never really necessary (or expected) to be working overtime.

Because of the shift to virtual distance scenario, we ended up working on a project for a charity rather than within the companies internal software. This was slightly disappointing and no one really understood why. Their justification was that with the term shortened to 5 weeks it would not be worth it. But since they paid us for the full 10 weeks, I do not see why they couldn't keep it longer and let us work on the actual projects. The good side is that we had full ownership of our charity project and could take wherever we wanted.

It was great to work on virutal collaboration and how to get teams going in calls, how to schedule sessions and keep record of things. How to use JIRA and Confluence when we have no physical access to a common whiteboard. How to brainstorm and how to form some sort of social connection. We ended up hanging out informally quite a bit as well over Zoom and it has boecome easier and more natural ever since.

The atmosphere was very relaxed and people do not wear suits or anything at this location. Everyone is very much just a software engineer going around their job in a relaxed way. There cannot be too much partying and etc with the virtual situation but I do not think there would have been anyway. It is a good balance and I have been told it is quite different in other locations, since Glasgow is one of the few Tech only offices.

It was quite well structured and organised with plenty of activities, and campus recruitment was always there to help us figure out things, especially in the beginning. Talks and events (virtual) were also very solid and they make sure to get some senior speakers at times that would be suitable for different timezones so everyone can take advantage of it. The trainings were also very organised and there was a weekly intern newsletter to make sure everyone is on par.

They gave us access to a lot of training resources via Pluralsight and we also got a secure code warrior tournament to learn about and practice lots of computer security skills, writing safe code and recognizing traditional exploit patterns. We also got the option to access soft skills training sessions and of course banking and finance. There was some mandatory training with varying degrees of usefulness but overall considering that it was remote it was quite strong.

Sounds like a good relaxing place to work with. The people I met were all amazing and there seemed to be some talented engineers around. However, overall it is not exactly at the top of my list just because I would love to write software that regular people see in action in their daily lives. Additionally the company's environmental record as a fossil fuel investor does not help in motivating me to work there. It's mostly a matter of there being companies with missions I identify more with

My team built a fantastic chemistry and we quickly got comfortable to joke around, talk about our lives outside the internship and build quite a pleasurable environment

I got to stay at home since it was virtual so quite cheap...

None... We worked from home

There was a pub quizz but it is hard to do these remotely