Industrial Placement Student Review

I have really enjoyed my year at Aldi and would recommend it to other students looking into doing a placement year. I felt it was very insightful as I got to see all sides of the business from working in store to working in head office alongside directors. I felt I gained a lot more confidence from being in such a varied working environment throughout the year. The job is challenging but is extremely rewarding.

While in store, your colleagues would feedback to you constantly and would appreciate your hardwork and dedication to your time in store. Aldi ensures everyone receives regular feedback as well as a yearly performance review which helps to ensure you can assess how you are doing as well as feel valued by those around you.

Being given an Area Manager as your mentor from day one really helps you feel looked after through the year, especially having spent the first two weeks of the placement with them in order to get to know them as well as learning the basics of the company. This allowed you to get feedback on your performance as well as someone you can direct your questions at during the year.

Aldi thrives in being efficient and therefore everyday with the company was fast paced and you never felt like you were watching the clock. It made each day really exciting as often you would be doing a number of different jobs within the day. It really gave you a good idea of how efficient and productive a team can be with the correct moral and leadership.

During the year I was given a huge amount of responsibility. This ranged from running a shift in a store, by opening or closing the store up for the day to working on a project for the directors. Having this responsibility was something I never took for granted as I was so lucky to be able to manage those around me.

I developed so many skills while on my year with Aldi. It showed me that with the face paced environment you actually thrive off the hours you do. The placement also gave me such confidence in my own ability to talk to those people around me, whether that be in meetings with directors or running the shifts and leading store assistants. I feel I will take this into my final year to make me be even more proactive, motivated and efficient in my day to day university life.

While in our head office time we spent a majority of time in the office where everyone was very friendly and helpful, particularly when we were undertaking project work. In store time most of your time is spent on the shop floor, but the atmosphere within both of the store teams I worked within was extremely welcoming and straight away you became respected as part of the management team in the store.

On starting the placement you are given a structured training plan to ensure you will have a good idea as to how your year will plan out. This is really helpful as then you can see how long store time is as well as which departments you will get to visit during the year.

I felt the company invested a lot into the training of you to ensure you got all the necessary training to help the store run efficiently rather than just being a spare part. The regular feedbacks and updates that we were given allowed you to know personally where to work on and this was always followed up on in your next meeting. It always felt rewarding when you had managed to master a new skill.

The Aldi Graduate scheme always appears in the Times Top 100 list of graduate employers, as it always compares very well to like for like graduate schemes. You are given a meeting at the end of your 12 months with the Managing Director of the region to assess and reflect on your year, with the possibility of a job on the graduate scheme.

During the year with Aldi you have two overnight stays in order for you to meet industrial placement students from other regions, as well as learn more about the business. While in head office you are split into groups within the placement students, allowing you to have more of a social scene with those around you due to working similar hours.

For my placement I lived at home which was really helpful and also meant I was able to save during the year. It meant I had friends from home still around which meant socializing in Chester wasn’t an issue due to already knowing the place and the people. Therefore I already knew what the cost of living would be going into the placement.

Due to living at home I already knew what the nightlife in Chester was like and how much it would cost. I knew what there was to do in the area, which really helped as you knew which restaurants were good and where to go during your days off. This meant you were able to make the most of your time off from work.

Outside of work we had the two IP placement events, as well as a Christmas meal. During office work we were working alongside other placement students which allowed us to socialize together. As I was part of a new store opening a store team bowling was arranged before the store opened which was an enjoyable evening.