Associate Study Manager Review

I worked on a variety of different projects over the course of the year; each one was different and provided its own set of challenges. I enjoyed the variability of the work, however the role did become fairly repetivie by the end of the year.

Our team was tight kint and contribution to team acitivites was always acknowledge and valued. I also built valuable relationships with people in other departments and they were always ready to praise any good performance.

My manager and I had bi-weekly 1:1 which gave me the opportunity to express any concerncs that I might have. She was very approachable and always ready to answer my questions. My manager was very busy and also managed a number of other colleagues so there were times when I felt I wasn't provided with enough guidance and support.

Each day was different; some days, especially before I was assinged a Clinical Study I was very bored, other days I could be rushed off my feet. I liked the fact that some days you had loads of meeting and was very busy whilst other days you had nothing on and could catch up with older tasks.

I did feel like I was given a lot of responsibility during my placment, but at no point did I feel like I was on my own and support was always availble if needed.

I learnt some great core business skills and project management skills that I could easily apply to future roles. I did not learn any skills that I could apply to my degree, but I did feel like I had matured over the year and was taking my career options a lot more seriously.

This was probably the worst part of the placment for me. Our team was global based and many UK individuals worked from home so the office was pretty much empty. It was good in a way that you got to know everybody very well, but most of the time it was dull and not very sociable at all.

The inital training was very well oragnised and gave us a good preparation for the work ahead of us. As part of placement, we were required to visit other sites and this part wasn't very oragnised and left to the last minute.

As I became more confident during the placement I was allowed to work on more challengeing projects and this required me to complete training courses .

My general impression was that pernament graduate opportunities in clinical research were very rare, so the future employment prospects in this area weren't good. However, other business areas have graduate opportunities which were very appealing to me.

I live and socialised with fellow placement students so I made some great friends over the year.We would go out for drinks after work or for a night out in London on the weekends.

Compared to central London, I found Uxbridge to be affordable and wasn't too pricey. I was used to paying central London rent so it was great to find affordable accommodation that was still relatively close to London.

The local area (Uxbridge) was a bit rubbish but it could also be fun. Going out to London wasn't too far and it was possible to come back on the train to West Drayton so this was the preferred option.

There was an events committe which oragnised a few good events. The gym was also nearby.