Undergraduate Engineer Review

As work goes, it was enjoyable. The tasks given to me were relevant to my knowledge base and taught me a lot of new skills. There was plenty of scope to experience work going on in the rest of the company too.

The people around me were professional and treated me as they would any other employee - they were friendly and willing to explain concepts unfamiliar to me due to my short time at the company.

My manager did not hold my hand through the placement and gave me a lot of freedom to define how I was to tackle the project given to me. I could always go to him and to others in order for help which was always constructive. In order to maximise my learning, my manager would often point me in the right direction rather than just spoon-feeding me an answer.

I never had a moment where I was at a loss as to what to do. Whether I was working on my project, going to meetings or seeing other parts of the business, I always had something to be getting on with.

The project I was tasked with completing was obviously not a crucial one to the business, but it was certainly pertinent to the work going on in my department. I was given complete control over organising my time over the three months and managing my project.

The transferable skills learnt in the office will prove invaluable in any working and professional environment. And the specific technical experience I gained definitely has relevance to my degree and potentially to further post-graduate study/work in the same sector.

As any good office should be it was professional but not pressured. There was always a low chatter round the place with something going on somewhere, and there was even free food put out every now and then.

The execution on the company's part was absolutely fine and there were no hiccups at all. It would have been nice to perhaps have had a few more events for all undergraduates in order for us to get to know each other a bit better and see more of the company too.

From my personal experience the training and development I got all came from working in the department into which I was placed - the technical knowledge I gained was great. There was an online generic training program to have a look at if you wanted, although I didn't bother. Being a 3-month placement student there didn't seem to be any real impetus to send me out on training programs which perhaps a full-time employee would have gone on.

Early on in the placement we were informed of the possibility of joining the company on its graduate training scheme after we've graduated. I accepted the invitation to interview.

Sadly, for various reasons, I was living far away from the majority of the other placement students who were staying in halls in Coventry. As far as I know they used to hang out a lot and go for drinks each Friday after work with graduate scheme employees too.

I lived miles away from where I was working so can't comment. The food outlets on site weren't cheap but weren't awful value (I think I was used to student prices).

Where I was living was great! But that's nowhere near work...

There were quite a few company clubs which people could join. There also seemed to be a good scheme for advancing the learning of employees through e.g. learning a language. My manager was involved in The Corporate Games and I know other employees who went on weekends away with various clubs.