Mechanical Engineering Vacation Student - Building Services Review

I really enjoyed my internship because I think that I was given good responsibility and, as a result, feel that I have truly contributed to the team. I gained a better understanding of the role of a mechanical engineer in the Building Serviced area. I enjoyed and found interesting the tasks and projects I was working on. The company was great and organised interesting events, such as lunch time talks, and social events. The employees were open and helpful and a pleasure to work with.

I did feel valued by my colleagues because they trusted me with tasks requiring responsibility and based some future design decisions on my results. They encouraged me to input my ideas into discussions, listened openly and followed up with actions to implement my ideas if appropriate.

I was working with various people on more than one project and so was not in daily direct proximity with my manager/supervisor but we did regularly meet with each other to discuss progress and how I was finding the internship and he made a lot of time for me in his busy schedule. We had a final review meeting at the end of the internship.

Most days I was considerably busy. This was especially true when I worked towards a design issue on one project. In general, I found that my personal work combined with team meetings fully filled the day. I enjoyed having lots to do and so often I asked for more work than perhaps I was meant to do originally. Near the end I was not quite as busy but still always had things to do.

I was given quite a lot of responsibility. The results from some tasks I carried out were used to make key design decisions and were discussed with more senior members of staff. I was also asked for my opinion and ideas. I felt like another member of the team and was pleasantly surprised that I was often given tasks as such.

Many skills, such as business and engineering related skills like efficiently working with others, good organisation etc. will definitely be useful to me in both my degree and career. Some skills, such as those more specific to building services (e.g. Revit skills) will be less useful to me during my degree but should still be useful in my future career.

The atmosphere in the office was very friendly and welcoming. Everyone seemed easy to talk to and it was clear that most employees genuinely really enjoy their jobs, which came through in the quality of their work and positive work ethic. Quite a few social events were organised throughout my 6 weeks there, such as lunches, drinks, sports activities, and the interns and graduates often ate lunches together.

It was generally well organised. Specific tasks were not laid out for me before arrival, but I was simply assigned to a project which meant that I could then speak with the manager and team members to assess what I could most usefully be doing at that time. Due to unforeseen circumstances, I had to be switched to a different project last minute and it was a bit slow to start, but this did not seem normal practice.

The employees would often take significant amounts of time helping interns and explaining aspects of a project or of the industry or anything else. We were also invited to attend events such as the lunchtime talks along with other staff, which are talks aimed at furthering the engineering knowledge of the staff, (and come with free lunch)

I will definitely be applying for their graduate scheme as I have really enjoyed the internship and believe Arup to be a great company. My work was interesting and stimulating, and I'm sure most of the other many various projects they do would be just as good. The company seems to care for and help to develop its graduates. I look forward to applying.

Interns and graduates would almost always meet for lunch, which was very sociable and nice. Sometimes employees would organise going for lunch with a large group, including everyone from senior managers to interns. Some afterwork drinks/dinner were arranged on Fridays or if there was a special occasion like a birthday.

The placement was in central Manchester. It is relatively expensive in central Manchester but can be relatively cheap in areas a bit further out of Manchester, both for accommodation and living costs. I lived with a family friend whilst doing the internship.

We went out about once a week and there was a great range of places to choose from. Manchester has a very good nightlife and the office was located in the centre, a few minutes walk from most places.

Being a city, there were many opportunities for activities to do outside of work. There were not many sporting or other activities organised by the company or employees.