Industrial Placement - Engineer Review

I rotated between 3 departments, 4 months at each, so my role varied significantly between each rotation. The main things I was doing that were common between departments was managing the development of parts, managing the process of taking them to the next phase in their development. Also creating, managing and analysing the results of engineering work requests and presenting the results to a team. Also work creating tools for the department to use like a database of results for a certain type of testing.

I have learnt many new skills and developed myself in a much more complete way than what i had done previously at university. Team working has been essential in all my tasks in this placement as it is rare I would do any piece of work without the influence of colleagues. This also therefore has required effective communication skills, both written and verbal. Time management and self-organisation have also been important to be able to balance multiple workloads at once.

Yes I was given real life projects and was able to lead them, but having the support from managers and team members at this time meant I could fall back on them at times where I was unsure or struggling. The tasks I've carried out have directly contributed to the productive operation of business critical projects. Having said that, I have worked on some arduous boring tasks which I feel were given to me only because it made sense to give it to the placement student, rather than a more senior engineer, and the task was not necessarily an important one.

I received full support throughout all 3 of my rotations during this placement. Each of the three managers would regularly have one to one meetings with me. These would act not only as a general check in, but we would also discuss any tasks that I had on at that time and try to resolve any task -specific issues I was having. Additionally, I would lean on other members of the team and not just my manager and they were always more than happy to explain things to me or answer any questions.

Having spent the whole placement year working from home this is a hard one to answer. Firstly everyone I've spoke to has been very friendly, and everyone has described how it's a good culture and atmosphere usually when everyone is in the office. I've not encountered any problems in regards to culture and atmosphere, but working from home means I've never met (or even seen the faces of) the vast majority of people I work with, which has obviously made it hard to form relationships and therefore properly gauge the company culture and atmosphere.

As my role has changed quite a bit between each rotation the level of enjoyment I've felt has varied. In one rotation I was working in a close-knit team at a fast pace and I really thrived in this environment, and hence was really enjoying it. However in other departments I found that a lot more independent working on much less critical tasks could become quite isolating and boring. I also think working from home, despite it's obvious benefits, has also impaired the extent to which I can enjoy the work.

Yes

I would definitely recommend others to apply to Cummins. I would say to try and learn as much about the company, the projects, the parts etc as soon as you arrive because not having that base level of knowledge would make any work you are doing a lot harder (i.e. actively make an effort to learn rather than just thinking that you'll pick it up as you go along). I'd also say to actively make an effort to integrate yourself within your team and form relationships. This is probably more important if working from home.