Capability Scientist (Industrial Placement) Review

I thoroughly enjoyed my time as an R&D Capability Scientist at Mars Care and Treats in Birstall. I settled into the team very quickly and through the company's focus on personal development my skills (both technical and personal) improved rapidly. Having just finished my industrial placement, I am already missing the work atmosphere and the time spent socialising outside of work.

During my placement, I was the only Industrial Placement student in the office and I was made to feel part of the team from the start. The projects I was assigned duirectly contributed to the business. Although they were challenging projects, the help and support was always available to assist me during any challenging aspects of the work.

My line manager was always available to give guidance when needed and the amount of support I recieved was flexible depending upon how much it was needed. During the induction and initial stages of my placement I had regular meetings in place with both my line manager and supervisor, but over time as I developed, these meetings reduced to project updates and personal development meetings as required.

The workload was very variable, but this would vary depending upon which team and project you were involved with. Ultimately, there was never an expectation that you should be managing your workload to a sensible level (not doing too much or too little) and I was coached through the appropriate way of dealing with these situations through effective planning and prioritisation (something which I initially found very difficult).

I was given a lot of responsibility to run my own projects and to be involved in other peoples projects as and when it was necessary. This involved networking with people both inside and outside of the business. This is a great opportunity to achieve a greater understanding of how the business works, how to communicate with people in a professional context and how to effectively work in team environment.

This skills gained during my placment year will be invaluable both in the final year of my studies and beyond. From a technical perspective, the role required me to apply scientific principles learned from my chemistry degree in a real world environment to solve problems. The problem solving aspect is important because it now allows me to break down large, complex challenges which i would have found impossible 12 months ago.

The nature of the role working in R&D in an FMCG company means that it is unlikely (and probably impossible) for a work placement to be set up and planned over a 12 month period as it could be for a company working in routine analysis or projects which are more long term. This put a lot responsibility on me to organise and prioitise my own workload. This was daunting at first, but I have hugely benefitted from it in terms of the development in organisational agility and time management.

A lot of focus is put on personal development at Mars. It has definitely made me more self aware and able to analyse my strengths and weaknesses. This allowed me to make a personal development plan for the year to work on my weaknesses and also expand my technical areas through both the application of my degree subject and learning its relevance in the petcare industry.

Working for a year on industrial placement at mars puts you in a great place to either apply for the grad scheme or direct entry into a role. The assessment methods and criteria were explained throughout my time on placement and you have the opportunity to talk to people working in any roles/grad schemes that you are interested in.

I was the only placement student on my site, however there was still a good social scene through both work organised events (such as team meals and christmas events) and casually meeting up outside of work. Leeds has got a lot of good restaurants and bars to choose from and is a great place to live.

Birstall is just south of Leeds and is not the easiest to get to without a car which limits options for living location.I lived close to the city centre in an apartment block and took the bus to work (which was quite expensive for both rent and travel) however this location was great for socialising as the city centre was only a 5-10 minute walk away and (for me) was preferable to living closer to work in a small town.