Assistant Solutions Developer Review

The technical skills and discipline that I have picked up over the last 12 months will be invaluable for my final year. Whilst my experience inevitably had its stressful moments, overall, I have enjoyed my placement immensely and it has helped me to determine what I would like to pursue in my career.

Roughly a third of the way through the placement I was given a lot more responsibility and as such, I feel like became a valued member of the team. So much so, that I was heavily involved in recruiting new full time team members. I also got daily queries from members of staff, from different departments, about a certain web site feature or process within the company.

Throughout my placement, support and guidance was available to me if I needed it; The Head of Web Development was always able to answer any technical queries I had. In the first quarter of my placement I had plenty of assistance from my supervisor who helped build up my skills and get used to the company’s platform. For the rest of my placement I had a different supervisor who worked remotely, however he was only an IM or a phone call away.

After the 4 weeks training, there wasn’t a day out of the remaining 12 months where I didn’t have a least one major project or multiple minor projects to work on.

By the end of my placement I was responsible for multiple major projects and was involved throughout their life cycles. Firstly, I consulted with the account managers with their proposals, providing them with several options the client could choose from, ranging in cost and how closely it would meet their needs. After this I collaborated with our designer to determine how to provide the end user with a great UX. During the development of sites, I communicated to the client via project management apps, email and telephone. Every so often I went to visit a few clients and work on-site. I was also heavily involved with completing enhancements that clients sometimes had during projects and then, after testing was complete, I was responsible for deployment. Occasionally I was required to train a member of the team on the company’s processes and writing documentation for these processes. Additionally, I wrote several tests that were used in the recruitment process for next year’s placements and full time team members. Being given such a large amount of responsibility enabled me to provide my input at crucial stages in projects and gain a deeper understanding of the clients’ requirements. This allowed me to deliver solutions that met the needs of client much more closely.

The discipline and technical skills that I have attained will be invaluable in my final year. Beyond my degree, I have learnt to have more confidence in my abilities and also the importance of communication.

On the whole, pretty good. I moved offices a couple of times and both were quite upbeat. To boost morale our Director would sometimes buy us ice cream or cookies!

Aside from the general 4 weeks training, I was able to sit next to my supervisor in the first few months and ask him for help. My Director also offered for me to choose a relevant short course to enrol in.

As a large proportion of ProspectSoft live near Oxford we were recommended to live there. Rent and utility bills were not too bad but getting around and eating out is quite expensive.

As Stokenchurch is quite small, we would sometimes go for a pint after work there and then if we were going out, we would usually go out in Oxford. Oxford has a lot of great (but expensive) bars and pubs.

There are some pretty active people at ProspectSoft; I would usually be at running, climbing, going to local gym to do circuits or playing badminton with at least one colleague from work during the week! We also completed Tough Mudder and Wolf Run as a team! Also, I think a few of my colleagues hosted a couple of games evenings.