Financial Analyst Review

I initially enjoyed my placement, but by the end of the year the tasks I was doing became repetitive and boring.

The people in my team were incredible, and really looked after me.

There was a distinct lack of support from my Professional Development Manager - interaction with them was rare. My line manager for the year interacted with me regularly, but was not particularly helpful in terms of personal development/guidance.

For the first half of the year I was fairly busy, but the workload was manageable. Towards the end of my placement the workload dropped as tasks became easier, and despite requesting more work I tended to be bored a lot of the time.

I feel that my team trusted me, and I was given responsibility for several important roles.

The skills I developed will help me in the corporate world - being able to communicate effectively and present to different audiences will hopefully be useful for the rest of my career.

The general atmosphere in my office was good - it was a small team, but everyone got on well.

The placement was organized well in terms of admin and training dates etc.

There was minimal investment in terms of long term development by the company - most of the personal development was self driven, with the occasional opportunity offered to everyone on the placement scheme.

Some of the schemes are slightly appealing, but the experiences of the people on those schemes that I have spoken to seem to vary a lot.

The social scene between placement students outside of London/Hursley was fairly poor. The main offices with lots of students tended to have good social scenes, but for those of us in smaller offices it was difficult to organize social events or to keep in contact with the other social groups.

The cost was fairly high due to being just outside London.

The nightlife was fairly poor unless you were willing to travel 45 mins into London.

Outside of IBM there were plenty of opportunities to join teams/clubs etc.