Bioanalyst Review

I really enjoyed my placement, my colleagues were friendly and approachable, the work I undertook was interesting and it challenged me throughout my placement.

I felt that my colleagues did value the work that I did as in busy periods I was able to pick up additional work and help out others when needed. I did feel like I was doing the work that no one else wanted to do (I got the scrapings of the barrel!) and sometimes during not so busy periods I felt like I got a bit forgotten, but overall I was definitely a valued member of the team.

My manager worked between sites and when he was on site, he was constantly in meetings and was very busy, so it was hard to pin him down when I needed him. However, he gave me so much support in writing my placement report. My supervisor was particularly supportive, and was always there to answer any questions I had or help with problems I encountered.

This varied a lot depending on the work load. The first couple of months were spent getting to grips with working in the lab and learning techniques. The middle six months were extremely busy due to a massive workload in our department, therefore on several occasions I stayed later than required to make sue work was finished. In contrast to this, during my last month I had next to nothing to do. As the end of my placement fell in the summer holidays, all but one of my team were on holiday, and there was little I could pick up in the lab because I would be leaving soon. I found it hard to make myself busy and ended up turning to people in another department to shadow them for something to do.

I was given quite a bit of responsibility during my placement. Once I got to grips with the lab work, I was able to develop and troubleshoot assays independently. As part of my project, I took lead role in organising a study and liaising with appropriate people outside of my department.

I feel like if I start my career in a similar area to my placement, my lab skills would be invaluable. I have a deep understanding of the area I have been working in. However, because I have only been working on one technique during my year, I feel like there is still a great deal of lab skills that I have not gained whilst other students at GSK have. It is finding the balance between depth and breadth of knowledge. Whilst I have a deep knowledge of one technique, others may have a broad understanding of many techniques that will help them in the future. This year has really helped develop soft skills such as communication and networking, presenting to large groups of people and writing in a scientific style. No matter where my career takes me, this skills I have learned will help me without a doubt.

I was based in a large open plan hot desking office, which I feel did nothing to help the atmosphere of the office. The idea of hot desking was to encourage people to sit in different places and talk to different people but this didn't happen. Everyone sat in the same place every day and had to pack up their things in to a locker at the end of the day. This meant you couldn't personalise anything and generally people sat in silence doing their work. It made day to day work very dull, and I ended up looking forward to getting in the lab just for a change of scenery.

My placement was generally well organised, however I didn't get my laptop until my second day. Since the first day was just introductions and tours, it didn't really affect the seamlessness.

I was trained to use exactly the same machines as the rest of permanent team. Every 3 months I had development meetings with my supervisor, where we went through how I was doing and what I/they could do to improve my placement experience.

GSK is an excellent company to work for. The management team really care for their staff and there are so many development opportunities in the form of secondments. I will definitely be looking to return after I graduate. They also offer opportunities to apply for their Future Leader programs (ahead of external candidates) and you can also sign up for them to email you about direct entry roles for 2 years after you leave.

I found it difficult myself as I was commuting from home and the other student in my department was not sociable in the slightest, however hearing from other people I know that there is a good social scene amongst IP students. Nationwide there is a student union called IP Unite, who organise social events. I thought this group was absolutely shocking as they only ever organised social events in London, and even then I could count on one hand how many events were organised over the year. The only events worth going to are the Christmas party and the Boat party on the river Thames.

I commuted from home so didn't pay rent, but living in Stevenage is fairly cheap and so is socialising. There is little to do in Stevenage so it is better to go to London to do things, but this ups the cost.

Rubbish!!!

If you sought out opportunities like sports events then yes.