Industrial Placement Student Review

Each day/week varies a lot. My time is split between planning experiments, doing lab work for my projects, doing lab work for other projects in the team, data analysis, putting data in a presentable format, and attending meetings. Aside from meetings, I have complete freedom in how I manage my time to complete my work. Some days I will be in the lab 9am to 5pm, other days I will be at my desk the whole day planning experiments or doing analysis. Most of the time I do a mixture of both.

Definitely. It's actually hard to express just how much I've learnt. This placement was my first experience working in a real lab outside of university practicals. Also, my placement is in a different field of Biology to what I study at university and requires a lot of very specialised techniques and equipment. So I learnt all my lab skills pretty much completely from scratch. I also learnt how to use very specialised software to perform data analysis; I was given access to paid resources and webinars to do so. To present data my team uses GraphPad Prism, again a software I had not used before and was able to learn how to use. I have also vastly developed my soft skills. I have learnt a lot from my supervisors about how to give presentations convincingly. I am now much more confident in interacting with colleagues professionally, even in simple tasks such as writing emails.

Yes. It actually suprised me how quickly my team was willing to give me responsibility. Literally as soon as I was taught a technique in the lab, I was allowed to do it autonomously and I was given a real project to apply it to. Coming from a background of zero knowledge about this field, two weeks after the start of my placement I was working with samples for a cancer drug study. My team also uses a lot of very expensive equipment and reagents, which I was allowed to use autonomously from the very beginning. I have worked on many projects over the course of my placement. For my two main projects, I had complete autonomy over what experiments to perform and what to try next. Both of my projects used cutting-edge techniques that aren't even used/known about by other members in my team. I presented one of my projects to another team, which was a strange experience presenting to much more experienced scientists. Other project work was often more routine, but still rewarding knowing that you are contributing to science.

My team was amazing, I felt like I could approach them any time I needed for support. Even though I was given a lot of responsibility, it was not too overwhelming because of their support. Most of my support came from my two supervisors, with whom I had regular weekly catch-ups (I did not actually have much contact with my line manager, everything was through my supervisors). However, other members of my team also supported me when I needed it. Compared to university, I was given a lot more support during my placement, since I was the only placement student in the team rather than getting lost in a sea of students at university.

It is hard for me to speak for the whole company, since it is such a large organisation. But my experience is that the general atmosphere is very friendly and welcoming. I feel that team-building was definitely encouraged; my team has been out on lunches together and we also took part in two volunteering days together. There were also diversity initiatives, for example there was a pride event and there are groups in the company for e.g. LGBTQ+, disability, etc. The company uses Workplace, which is like a version of Facebook for companies. This definitely facilitated a feeling of 'togetherness' across a large company. On the more negative side, there is a pressure to always do more work. As a placement I was shielded from this somewhat, but I know other members from my team feel pressured by unrealistic deadlines to work outside their working hours.

I enjoyed it immensely. It completely exceeded my expectations, primarily because of how supportive my supervisors and team were. I have learnt so many new skills and developed my confidence. I also gained more insight into the corporate world and the pharmaceutical industry, seeing both the positives and negatives. Also, I feel like the work I do is meaningful. I would definitely do it all again. However, I think you should bear in mind that it is such a large company that a lot would depend on your team. I know other placement students who have had a less positive experience because their team was less supportive.

Yes

Don't think that you are not good enough to apply. During the application process, I thought there was zero chance of me getting a placement at such a competitive organisation. However, I am so glad that I took the chance. Also don't worry about lack of experience, so long as you are willing to learn you can learn very quickly on the job. If you do get a placement, there is no need to stress over the summer about learning everything before you arrive. As a placement student part of your job is to learn, so once you actually start your placement your supervisors/team can give you pointers about what to learn.