Placement Student Review

At Atkins they have a great team atmosphere, making Atkins a great place to work. The reason you do a placement is to gain experience of the industry you want to enter into, for me Atkins was the perfect company. Atkins had a large range of projects going on and encouraged younger engineers to get involved. Making the placement challenging but very enjoyable.

Even though Atkins is such a large company, the teams are split into much smaller groups ensuring that no one feels lost within the company. The value you feel from the colleagues comes within the project teams as this is where your technical work is used. However through the Personal Development Reviews this is reflected in the management structure too.

The technical challenges presented on the placement meant that being given support and guidance was essential to developing as an undergraduate engineer. The management team recognise that you are still developing and to get the most out of you they need to invest in a support network for you, which they happily provided.

Naturally within any business workload varies. With a number of graduates starting at a similar time as placement students the graduates are prioritised in resourcing, understandably from a business perspective. However there was always a team of people trying to get the right level and right quantity of work for me.

With a temporary member of staff it is hard to receive too much responsibility, however when this question is taken in context of what I originally expected then I was extremely impressed with the amount of responsibility I received. I took ownership of several calculations as well as some minor project management roles.

The experience changed the way I viewed university life and how I approach my studies. The skills I truly developed on the placement was to actually understand the first principles and methodically analyse the problem and come up with an applicable solution, not just learning processes like before my placement. Since returning to university I have excelled especially in group projects where engineering solutions are required.

The office atmosphere was very positive with a large range of different disciplines and specialists, all willing to impart the experience they have gained over the years. On a more social note free tea and coffee was provided with each bay doing tea runs creating a great team atmosphere, with some bays even baking cakes on certain days of the week. A really enjoyable team to work in!

Atkins have many placement students every year, hence the process was extremely organised with everyone in the office understanding the role of a placement student within the office environment.

Atkins spent a large amount of time and effort to ensure that I was developing in line with my personal development objectives as well as the looking forward to professional institutions objectives giving me an idea of experience I will need in future and areas where I need to improve. Atkins allowed me to go on several training courses to allow me to develop as well as having formal Personal Development Review meetings.

I was invited back to complete a summer placement with Atkins straight after my Year In Industry, as well as between my 3rd and 4th year. Subsequently I was sponsored through university for my 3rd and Masters year, with the offer of a job once I have graduated. With the sponsorship I was given a mentor within the company to help with any university problems and keep me updated with what is going on in the office. Everything about the placement suggested that this was a company which I would love to work for.

All of the graduates at Atkins welcome in the placement students to their social activities with one main social happening once a month. A couple of times a year there are team socials where everyone from your team goes out and does an activity (paid for by the company). These are good social occasions where all grades of staff can socialise together.

Working in Bristol the cost of living and socialising is not as cheap as university, but that is to be expected! However you can live in the centre of town as Atkins put on a free bus service from the centre of town to the office. Which is extremely helpful and saves a lot of money driving as well as utilising public transport.

The nightlife in Bristol is good, there are many places to go and see!

Atkins have a sports and social club where you can meet with many like minded colleagues. These include football, squash, climbing, touch rugby and many more. The sports and social clubs also run many very popular social activities.