Insight Assistant Review

I had a great time working at Waitrose because my role was varied - although sometimes hard when creating reports or presentations and other more desk based work, I had fantastic opportunities to go and present work around the business, attend interesting meetings and make lots of visits to our branches and competitor stores as well as conferences and training days.

A large part of what made me enjoy my placement was the team I worked in and the people I met along the way. My team were extremely friendly and welcoming from the very start - a chatty group who laugh a lot and are also really supportive of the placement student's development. In general all people that I have worked with at Waitrose are very nice and personable - it creates a lovely working environment.

My manager has always been eager to provide me with opportunities to develop my skills, especially ones that I have expressed a desire to work on. As well as this, she has ensured that I am given interesting projects whilst still providing help and guideance with more regular tasks. She is open to my suggestions and I have learnt a lot from her this year - I will miss working for her!

There were quieter times but mostly I was very busy which I preferred - my manager helped understand the importance of communicating my workload.

I was so lucky at Waitrose to be given some really high responsibility tasks, from project managing some key research to presenting to Director level management. My colleagues and manager were really encouraging of me to push myself whilst providing the support I needed to gain these achievements.

Not only have I developed key skills that I'm sure will help my employability as a graduate and make the most of my last year at University, my placement at Waitrose has helped me develop my emotional intelligence and more personal skills.

As previously stated, the atmosphere is lovely with many friendly people who have lots of time to chat to you. Open plan offices help this and having daily lunches with colleagues is nice to build relationships. Its quite relaxed in terms of dress sense, chattiness and also there isn't much hierarchy eg. Head of Department sits among team at desk and every level of management is approachable and friendly.

I always had work to do and often knew what the next few weeks would look like.

Quarterly training sessions with other placement students organised by HR were useful. My team were constantly giving help, advice and guidance where needed and would check the my goals for personal training and development were being met.

No advantage over other graduates that apply to the Waitrose graduate scheme - for example, other companies seem to let placement students skip some stages of the application process but Waitrose do not offer this. Also, no offer/guarantee of grad job at the end of placement like other companies give - not even chance to interview at the end of placement to try and secure this.

Lived in a student house with 4 others on placement at Waitrose so had a really good time there. Also went out for drinks/to events like Ascot as a larger group of placement students.

Same as at my University for rent etc. - paying for petrol to commute to work meant my living costs were higher

Went out where I lived in Reading, not in Bracknell where I worked as this area is too industrial. In Reading there are a good mix of pubs, clubs and cocktail bars similar to what I had at Uni

Yes lots of clubs and societies to join but I didn't get involved apart from making some friends at the Waitrose gym I used and did classes at. Went to the Great Partnership Picnic to celebrate 150 years of the John Lewis Partnership.