This review was submitted over 4 years ago, so some of the information it contains may no longer be relevant.
Rating
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The Role
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The Company
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The Culture
- 1. To what extent did you enjoy your work placement or internship?
- 2. To what extent did you feel valued by your colleagues?
- 3. To what extent were you given support and guidance by management/your supervisor(s)?
- 4. How busy were you on a daily basis?
- 5. How much responsibility were you given during your placement?
- 6. To what extent did/will the skills you developed, and training you received, assist you in your degree studies and beyond?
- 7. What was the general atmosphere in your office?
- 8. How well organised was the overall work placement or internship set up?
- 9. In terms of personal training and development, to what extent did the company or firm invest in you?
- 10. What were the perks on your work placement?
- 11. How appealing are future employment prospects within the organisation?
- 12. Was there a good social scene amongst any fellow placement students/colleagues?
- 13. What was the cost of living and socialising in the area you worked in?
- 14. What was the Nightlife like in the area you worked?
- 15. Were there many opportunities to get involved in activities outside of work?
The Role
The WB UK placement year was thoroughly enjoyable from a work perspective but also on the social side of things. I was given a great amount of responsibility for an intern and felt like a valued member of my team. The work was not too repetitive and I myself was very interested in the industry and how quickly it is changing. On the social side of things, there were around 50 interns in total which was great fun, and plenty of great perks like the occasional premiere ticket and free Blu-Rays
I definitely enjoyed working with my team and was given important tasks that helped me to feel trusted and valued. Not only this, but other teams that I worked with along the were also very genuine. I never felt looked down upon or irrelevant.
My manager(s) were both very helpful and made time to give me guidance, constructive criticism and even just to chat when things were stressful, despite their very busy schedules. They also were not hesitant to let me know if I was not putting enough effort in or could do better, which was very helpful.
I always had work to do daily, because my job is based around specific release dates of films and TV there were periods where I had more work to do, but I never had to stay in the office over hours on a regular basis, only during busy release periods and when I was hosting screenings for sales customers. If weekly or more urgent work was limited, my line manager would give me larger, more long-term projects to work on based around market research that would keep me occupied.
I enjoyed the level of responsibility that I had as it was not too stressful, however, I could tell that some other interns had more responsibility than me, mostly due to my role specifically, as a lot of the work that my team does is based around legal contracts and confidential meetings with customers that I was not privy to.
I really think that the more basic office skills and etiquette that I have developed over my placement year will be incredibly useful in future. Not only for my final year of uni, where my time management and prioritization skills will hopefully carry on and be used for my studies, but even more so outside of Uni. My ability to conduct myself in an office environment, work well under pressure, keep an organised schedule, present, take notes and finally use Microsoft Office, SAP and salesforce more effectively will be hugely beneficial in future.
The Company
The atmosphere was generally very fun and relaxed, but everyone made sure to get their work done on time. There was always someone willing to stop for a quick chat or help out with some work, and everyone seemed to get along quite well. The only times when it was less enjoyable was when the majority of people took holiday and the office was very quiet.
WB is known to have a very dedicated and established placement scheme with around 50 interns, and this was obvious from my time spent there. Everyone knew what their roles were and were given sufficient induction weeks to learn from our previous interns, as well as plenty of support afterwards.
WB had some interesting training and development programs for the large number of interns there were, including sessions on “presenting me” – which focussed on finding your strengths and weaknesses in a working environment and how to improve upon weaknesses and use strengths to full potential. Another session we had was project management, which gave us some time management and prioritisation techniques. We also had a personality type session which was very interesting, that used the Myers Briggs questionnaire for Extraversion vs Introversion, Intuition vs Sensing, Thinking vs Feeling and Judging vs Perceiving. Finally, we had induction and reflection sessions at the end and beginning of the year that were also very helpful. All in all, WB had a very established intern training course and even had an intern working in the intern training department.
Company Parties/Events
Staff Sales/Staff Shop
Working from home
WB do not have a grad scheme in place but there are plenty of people working at the company that used to be interns, and this exposure helped them when trying to return full time. As to whether or not I could come back, I'm not sure.
The Culture
Most if not all of the placement students were very social and I made a number of close friends throughout the year that I will be keeping in contact with. The full time employees were also very friendly and always invited interns along for celebrations/drinks or anything else going on
London. :(
London obviously has some incredible nights out if you can afford them, and Holborn being very central made it easy to go to these nights out after work. Again the only negative was the cost of going out in central London.
There were a few good opportunities like fitness days, charity events, premieres and more, but the one that stands out the most was the Centrepoint charity sleep-out for homeless youth, to which WB would double our sponsor if we reached a certain amount.
Details
Placement (10 Months+)
London
June 2017