Sales Support Intern Review

I had a great experience at Intel. It is a large multinational company with an established internship scheme. Within my role, I have had the opportunity to meet our customers and both attend and organise events. There are also intern committees such as sports & social, Intel Inspire, and the publishing committee. Intel Inspire has been a very rewarding part of my internship, where I had the opportunity to get involved in volunteering to lead STEM activities for younger generation of pupils.

I felt that I was valued by my team, although, I believe that there was a lack of trust between myself and my team during my placement year and did not develop much of the course of the year. In addition, as my team were rarely in the office (as they were not all based on the Swindon site), I found that it was an obstacle when it came to settling in and learning about my role.

I had the rare experience of having two mangers during my placement as the organisation went through a restructuring. One of my managers did not know too much about what I was doing day to day but when we spoke, they would provide me with opportunities that I was more interested in (in regards to my career prospects) to get involved in. This allowed my to push myself to understand the company on a deeper level in a short period of time. My other manager cared more about my development and knew more about my day to day work as I spoke to them more regularly, however, I found that I was not fulfilling my potential as I was being asked to do more admin-based tasks. I also had a supervisor and a "buddy" who were fantastic in supporting me through the year, particularly my buddy as we spoke very regularly to ensure I was progressing and getting me involved during internal and external discussions.

This was very much dependent on the team you were in. For me, it varied during different time period as much of it would depend on where you were in the quarter, it would either be very busy or having not much to do. When I first started in July, I was not very busy as I was learning and developing all the skills necessary for the job. However, I became incredibly busy from August to October and then the work load decreased over the Christmas period.

Again, this was very much dependent on the team you were in. It varied on the time during the quarter, if my team was busy then I had more work to do but when it was quieter, my team were able to do more of the work so I had less to do.

have developed many skills during my time at Intel skills - both soft and technical. I had the opportunity to work closer with the marketing department and get involved with the committees that will benefit me in the future.

I found the office atmosphere really nice, although most of my team was based offsite, everyone was friendly and willing to support me in any project I was doing. I was also provided with all the equipment I needed to perform my job well, and found the office really nice to work in.

I thought the placement was well organised from the application process through to getting the job, everything was organised and simple and easy to follow. Although, when I first started everything was slightly more chaotic as I did not have an intern to learn from (this is not typically the case).

I think that Intel did not invest in my training, although, I did had access to general training courses and courses that were required for my job. However, I was also given the opportunity to shadow other departments that I was interested in and ability to explore different avenues, which has been invaluable in making my future career options.

As an intern, you are encouraged to reapply after graduating, although you are not guaranteed a place, you will have a significant advantage over those who apply externally. However, in most cases, the positions that are open are in the business operations department.

Yes, there are lots of socials and events run by the intern committees, both within and out of work hours. This provided us with the opportunity to get to know other interns, even those from other sites.

The living cost is much cheaper than my university accommodation and many other places. I was able to walk to work in under 20 minutes, which was very convenient. In addition, Swindon is an ideal location to travel to Bath, Bristol, Birmingham and London on the train fairly cheaply.

The night life is okay, it would have been nicer to have more options in terms of places to go to but the intern community make the night life much more exciting. There are lots of bars, shops, cafes and restaurants to visit, in addition to the outlet.

There are many opportunities to get involved with different committees. I joined the Intel Inspire, publishing and Involved committees. My favourite has been volunteering to run STEM activity sessions for local schools. It has been such a lovely and rewarding experience to have alongside my day-to-day job . It has also provided many opportunities to get involved and take a lead on things that you wouldn't think. I am a non-technical intern and I created and led an Artificial Intelligence (AI) session.