Industrial Placement Student Review

Practically everyone I have worked with has been friendly, helpful and accommodating. However the work I have been doing has not always aligned with what I am looking for in my future engineering career.

Extremely. I feel very much like a colleague and an equal and that my contributions are appreciated/my judgement is trusted. People often thought I was on the graduate scheme which I suppose is a compliment!

Plenty at first, however my supervisor changed midway through the year. My new supervisor is very difficult to get any time with. I have gone out of my way to find work through other supervisors to keep myself busy.

Workload varied considerably throughout the year, though I often found myself with less to do than I would like. One of the problems is the slowness inherent in the pharmaceutical industry meaning changes takes a very long time to implement.

A lot. I have been involved on multiple important projects, including a multimillion pound investment on site. Considering this is a pharmaceutical manufacturing environment I was pleasantly surprised by the amount I was allowed to do without having my hand held constantly.

Other than improving my Excel skills and learning some statistical analysis techniques, I am not sure I will have developed any skills relevant to my degree. Knowledge of the pharmaceutical industry (and its regulation), manufacturing and packaging technology, process/machinery validation and lean/six sigma principles will potentially be useful in future.

The atmosphere was good although often quiet. Everyone was extremely friendly and happy to talk/help whenever asked. Unfortunately several people left the office during my placement (either through moving within or leaving the company) which led to quite a subdued atmosphere and times when I would be alone in the office.

Not brilliant, it has to be said. There’s no specific setup for placement students, although I was allowed to tag along to the majority of the graduate training events. I have tried to get things in motion for the next IP student so hopefully their year will be a bit more structured. Poor organisation seems to be a fault with the business as a whole rather than with just placement students it has to be said.

As stated, I was allowed to tag along to as many of the graduate training events as I wanted.

There are certainly roles within the organisation that I would be interested in and the people I've worked with have made me feel like I would be welcomed if I came back.

Pretty good. Curry nights, Christmas party, the graduates especially met up often.

Pretty reasonable. Rent in a shared house ~£280/month.

Fine I’m sure if you’re after that kind of thing. Leicester and Loughborough are both university towns so have plenty of nights out/pubs/clubs.

There were opportunities for various things (walking, football, help in the community, etc)