Design Engineer Review

I thoroughly enjoyed my placement at the Keystone Group. Great company to work with which provide a comfortable working environment. Keystone has a lot to offer to its employees and has taught me so much in the industry whilst providing me with a number of key skills to help me in the future.

All colleagues on my team made me feel very valued and saw me as a regular employee rather than just a placement student. I was given the same jobs as everyone on the team and not seen and not made to feel lower than anyone else. Good relationships were created from day one at my time at Keystone with everyone making me feel very welcome. Everyone was super friendly and always willing to help out.

My manager worked with me directly and gave me a well organised and structured system to complete the jobs required. I was trained from day one and guided throughout the process to become a confident designer. At the same time I was still thrown into the deep end and provided the same amount of jobs as anyone else on the team. However, constant help was always at hand.

There was never a boring day at the Keystone Group. There were always jobs that needed to be completed. Every employee was provided the right amount of work in relation to their abilities and was always kept busy. However, I often found sometimes unforeseeable things can happen to certain jobs causing a job to become more difficult and more time consuming. It takes excellent time management to stay on top of this and ensure that all deadlines are met. At the same time other employees were always there to offer a helping hand and work as a team to get the jobs done.

I was given the same amount of responsibility as everyone else on the team. I was given my own jobs and had my own customers to look after. I was responsible for ensuring my customers were kept happy and that I had succeeded in designing and providing the product they required which was tailored to their needs.

Completing a placement year at Keystone provided me with a number of key skills which will help me not only in my degree but for the future after completing my studies. My skills in CAD were enhanced massively after a using number of different software's daily for real live jobs. Good time management and communication skills were gained after constantly liaising with customers throughout the year and ensuring all jobs are completed to their deadlines. Most importantly general confidence and feeling of being ready and eager to start in industry after graduating is one attribute I am very thankful to Keystone Group for.

A very large open environment of the office area made for a great atmosphere. All employees were friendly and very talkative and helped me to settle in very quickly. The general atmosphere was great in terms of being comfortable whilst doing work as well as motivational.

The full process and set up was very well organised and structured in a great manor. From day one I was told background into the company and what they expect and completed a full introduction week giving me an insight to my role and what was expected from me within my placement year. There were excellent resources at hand if I ever had any queries or questions, as well as a great training program/ process which helped me throughout my time at the Group.

Keystone invested heavily in my development to become a great design engineer. I feel this is a good reflection of the Group considering I was only contracted for a 12 month placement yet so much time was invested to teach me so much about the industry and further my skills. I was even sent on tutorials in Milton Keynes to learn new design software.

I had an amazing experience at the Group and learnt a great amount and picked up a number of useful skills. I hope to continue my development in industry with Keystone in the very near future.

The group ensured a good social scene with other placement students through organising a number of events for us to attend. The most popular ones included a fully paid for meal out with all placement students.

The cost of living was relatively cheap. There were a number of options for places to live including studio flats and flat shares all with in 20-30minute walking distance from the company. There were also a number of pubs located around the town for socialising after work with other colleagues.

The town itself didn't have much of a nightlife other than a few a pubs. However, it wasn't difficult to get yourself to cities next door for a good night out.

Keystone group organised sports events such as football for employees to get involved in. Different branches of the company would go head to head weekly giving the chance to meet new people with in the company. There was also a number of different social activities you could take part in.