SDET Intern Review
by Microsoft
This review was submitted over 4 years ago, so some of the information it contains may no longer be relevant.
Rating
-
The Role
4.5
-
The Company
4.6
-
The Culture
3.5
- 1. To what extent did you enjoy your work placement or internship?
- 2. To what extent did you feel valued by your colleagues?
- 3. To what extent were you given support and guidance by management/your supervisor(s)?
- 4. How busy were you on a daily basis?
- 5. How much responsibility were you given during your placement?
- 6. To what extent did/will the skills you developed, and training you received, assist you in your degree studies and beyond?
- 7. What was the general atmosphere in your office?
- 8. How well organised was the overall work placement or internship set up?
- 9. In terms of personal training and development, to what extent did the company or firm invest in you?
- 10. What were the perks on your work placement?
- 11. How appealing are future employment prospects within the organisation?
- 12. Was there a good social scene amongst any fellow placement students/colleagues?
- 13. What was the cost of living and socialising in the area you worked in?
- 14. What was the Nightlife like in the area you worked?
- 15. Were there many opportunities to get involved in activities outside of work?
The Role
Great opportunity; got to work on a real Microsoft product. High amount of impact possible, and enough resources to try whatever you want. High standards, so allowed to invest in quality in all tasks. Plenty of non-job factors in the placement too; collaborating on setting up internal events, working with youth groups, doing charity work. Lots of opportunities and encouragement to pursue certification. Many events on-campus.
Interns valued highly on engineering team; treated same as full-timers. Owning a feature area made you authoritative on it, regardless of seniority. Everyone got to be expert of something.
No micromanagement; line manager trusted us, so a lot of time was self-directed, or decided by team. Feedback provided on request. Lots of exposure to and help from the other team members. Would have preferred more supervision though, since at times it almost felt like I wasn't being watched.
You invest in the project as much as you feel like. Very loose deadlines, so rarely a need to force self. In practice I worked quite late, exploring things that I took an interest in. I gave myself more work than I needed to.
Even my first tasks were sweeping ones that affected the ongoing engineering process for the whole product. I was trusted to do critical infrastructure work.
I learnt the test discipline, as well as the infrastructure and technologies associated with it.
The Company
Outsiders described our office as a 'constant party'. Collaboration was highly encouraged, so a lot of time was spent discussing problems with colleagues instead of rote-coding.
The intern community had lots of teams, ongoing projects and milestone meetings. However, engineering was a bit of an island; even within charity groups we were homogenous. We were spread thin across the offices, and the graduate program wasn't prepared for fast-tracking to a similar job.
We are given tasks on the assumption that we will learn the technology on the job. Interns constituted a large amount of the UK engineering effort; the assumption that we could pick up the skills required was a brave one that paid off.
Subsidised Canteen
Subsidised/Company Gym
Company Parties/Events
Working from home
Was invited to interview for an international position after good feedback from my team and line manager. However wasn't offered job, nor feedback as to why.
The Culture
Good social life, and a lot of events, but converged on cliqueism. Common to live with colleagues.
Medium rent (~£300/month), but nightlife expensive.
Expensive but frequent.
Much charity work, also conferences.
Details
Placement (10 Months+)
South East
November 2013
