Placement Engineer Review

I thoroughly enjoyed my placement at Nissan Sunderland. Along with a large intake of other placement students for a good social scene, I was given lots of responsibility and felt like a well valued member of the team. Both factors lead to a strong work and social life and a very enjoyable placement.

In my role i was given the same job as a graduate engineer would leading me to have large projects and experience different areas within Nissan and specifically the design process, despite being given a role of large responsibility i felt very supported and valued by my team who would always go out of their way to help me out if stuck.

Over the course of the year i had regular meetings with my supervisor to monitor my progress on current projects and I had a appraisal half way through the scheme with my manager to look at the first half of my placement and make any changes if i was unhappy with anything

Most of the time through the placement i had the perfect balance of work with long projects and working through at my own pace, however sometimes at the end of a project it could get slightly boring when waiting for contractor responses to quotes and bits out of your control to fall into place

I was given lots of responsibility in my role, i worked as a design engineer in the new model introduction team which was a fast paced environment where i was required to meet strict deadlines on large installations. The projects i was given i felt were important in the new model process and made me feel like i was making a difference

The major skill i improved on during my placement scheme was my computer aided design (CAD) skills, i was pushed to attend various training courses on a variety of computer design packages including catia autoCad and siemens NX. All these packages will help me in my final year projects as CAD is an integral aspect of the course

There is a friendly atmosphere within the office everyone has similar drive and work ethic, during the selection process you are matched with a team that would most suit you which is done well and leads to a good working environment. Along with this under the great place to scheme lots of effort is given to keeping work place moral up

Overall the set up of the on boarding for the scheme i think could be improved but the HR department are very receptive to constructive criticism and take it all on board and organise meetings to discuss how the processes can be improved each year. But once here and in the job there is no issues with the set up of the placement

I was given lots of opportunity within the year for personal development and technical skills based training, having attended many courses which Varied from technical job specific such as learning different types of computer aided design packages to more personal development opportunities like leading yourself, assertiveness training or presentation skills courses.

The grad scheme is very appealing as it is very competitive and highly sought after due to Nissan status as an internationally recognised company. Further more the placement scheme has put me in a great position to apply for this with the connections i have already made and having the right work experience so the company doesn't have to re invest in training again.

The social element was heavily pushed at the start of the placement with a Facebook page made for all the students so people could connect with other students and make friends or find people to live with for the upcoming year, however when in the placement the social element was not very encouraged

I live in the city centre of Newcastle and the cost of living is quite low, of all other people in varying cities across the UK that i know i believe rent in the Newcastle area to be the cheapest. other things such as the price of food and utilities is pretty much constant in price, level with the rest of the UK

The area i live in (Newcastle) is particularly known for its nightlife, as it is a student city due to two popular universities (Newcastle and Northumbria) both being located here there is a large variety of bars restaurants and clubs that would cater for all different preferences from loud raves to chilled riverside bars.

Nissan has a sports and social club where i think there are sports teams you can get involved in but these are not very heavily advertised so they tend to fall under the radar slightly. Outside of work though there i plenty to do if you seek it out from win tasting to trampolining