Internal Communications Executive Review

This has been by far the best experience in a workplace I have ever undertaken. I was working as an Internal Communications Executive and experienced three different placements throughout my ten weeks. Getting an insight into the different areas in this placement has been extremely valuable. I have been involved with a variety of different tasks everyday, and this is what has made the internship so enjoyable. I have had so many opportunities to get involved in everything the department does and was given a large amount of responsibility straight away. I have really enjoyed my time here and everyone has made me feel so welcome.

My colleagues are one of the main reasons why I have enjoyed this placement so much. I was able to settle in straight away and this was all down to them. At the end of each mini-placement, I was actually gutted to be leaving each team that I had been in as I felt as if I had known them all for ages and got on with them all so well! Fortunately, I still keep in contact with them and aim to carry on networking with them in the future.

As I was based in various teams across my internship, I did not see my line manager much throughout the placement. However, we caught up whenever we were at the same location and through email. My line manager also made sure that I was assigned a temporary manager in each team that I checked in with regularly, and this also gave me the opportunity to speak about my progress with lots of different people. This actually worked rather well as my line manager was given feedback about my performance from a range of different people which has shaped my personal development plan.

There was never really a time where I felt like I had nothing to do throughout my entire placement here at E.ON. There were times, however, where I had a lot to be getting on with whereas there were other periods where I had a lot less to be doing - the balance wasn't perfect. I never felt bored throughout this internship as there is always something to be learning about or people to be networking with. Deadlines could be quite tight at times, but there was not a huge amount of pressure on me.

I had so much responsibility straight away. On my first day, I was editing articles that were to be published on the Portal to over 10,000 colleagues across the UK. I have since produced many articles myself after conducting my own research and have completed tasks that the rest of the team would find themselves doing on a regular basis. It is a great feeling knowing that you have contributed to the operation of the business. Of course, at first this can be extremely daunting but once you get stuck in, your confidence grows hugely.

Due to the nature of the job, I have found that the skills I have obtained and developed will assist me for the rest of my life. Not only have I increased my commercial knowledge, I have increased my levels of confidence, improved my network, improved my decision making abilities and become better at learning from constructive criticism. It goes without saying that my ability to put together articles, analyse data and pay attention to small detail has improved and this will undoubtedly affect the way I construct my assignments for university.

The atmosphere changes drastically depending on the office I was in. For example, at the Headquarters, the mood was a lot more professional, whereas other offices had a more laid back approach to working (providing the work was completed on time and to a good standard). This didn't make much of a difference to me at the end, as I was so busy I didn't have time to do much socialising with my colleagues. There was fun to be had at times but largely the atmosphere was typical of a professional workplace.

Before I started my internship, I was well informed by my manager about the placements I was going to be undertaking. However, until I actually began each placement, I was largely unaware about the types of tasks that I was going to be undertaking. Therefore, I made sure I asked my colleagues about the sorts of things each team does so that I was more aware of what I was going to be doing. I was informed about each day in time to adapt. For example, if I was to attend a conference or a meeting, I was told in time to make arrangements to get there and plan for the day. There were sometimes periods of uncertainty about what I was supposed to be doing but this didn't have much impact. If I had completed my workload, there was always something else that the team could provide for me to do.

E.ON are massive believers of investing in yourself. There are so many opportunities to progress and everyone I spoke to had been in more than three different roles throughout their time at the company. This attitude to learning and development was invested into me straight away. I now know my next steps to progress within the company and there are so many opportunities to do so. My manager is currently taking me through the different graduate schemes I can undertake here at E.ON and there is an opportunity to secure a place on a graduate scheme before I begin my final year at university.

Once getting a foot in the door with E.ON, the prospects for the future are huge. There are so many different roles and schemes that you can get involved in. If you impress on you summer placement, your manager can nominate you to fast track onto the graduate schemes and you can go into your final year at university knowing you have a graduate role secured. Once you are in your role, the progression doesn't stop there. There are plenty of other opportunities, such as the Early Talent Pool to help you progress to managerial roles within no time at all. The possibilities really are endless here.

Unfortunately, I started my internship very early in comparison to other students and therefore I only began socialising with them towards the end of my placement. However, there is a lot of encouragement to socialise with your peers as there is a lot of emphasis on us becoming the future leaders. Although we don't explicitly work together, we often have lunch together and there are regular community days for us all to just meet up and see how we're all getting along. This is really nice way of sharing experiences and networking with potential future colleagues.

I carried out my internship in offices that were not too far from my house, therefore I commuted and I cannot comment on the cost of living. However, the facilities around Coventry and Nottingham are fairly cheap and allow you to easily socialise with your colleagues. The costs in the canteen were oddly priced, however. Sometimes a large (and often unhealthy) meal wouldn't cost too much, yet a small salad could cost you more than a large meal. This is something that a lot of colleagues commented on.

I didn't actually go out into Nottingham or Coventry whilst I was on placement so I can only comment on past experiences. I love the nightlife in Nottingham as there's often a lot of students out and the night is quite cheap. There's always bars and clubs open no matter what day it is. However, Coventry is a bit more limited. Again, I can only comment on previous experiences but there's not as many places to go. Everywhere is still quite cheap however.

There wasn't too many opportunities to get involved in outside of work but it's really difficult as a department to get together. As we are based all over Nottingham and Coventry, it was difficult to socialise as a whole team as it is quite far to travel just to have a few drinks for example. There were times when we all worked from the same place, but with everyone having other commitments or having to travel for two hours, it was rather difficult.