Project Assistant Review

Day to day the role involved working alongside the project manager and project team to progress and support the needs of the project. Thus included tasks such as creating PowerPoints for project reviews, assisting in the day to day running of meetings, picking up any other responsibilities that the PM may give to you to manage e.g. managing a smaller element of the project. Or providing support through more administrative tasks such as email.

Being on placement at Mace definitely supported my development and taught me new skills that will benefit me long-term. Being provided with real responsibility helped me to develop my stakeholder management and communication skills throughly. It has also developed my project management skill set - this can be broken into the risk management, planning and cost management side of working as a project manager. Working at Mace also developed my skill set through experiential learning from the project team.

I was given an appropriate amount of responsibility during my placement. Upon joining I was not given a lot of responsibility as the project was unsure about how they could best utilise me for my own benefit as well as the project’s benefit. However as time went on, I made sure I gained responsibility and trust by asking for more meaningful work to do so that I would gain benefit for myself from the placement year - without asking however I would not have had a meaningful experience at Mace.

The support I did receive whilst in placement was adequate for my time there and I am sure that if I were to have an issue it could be resolved by my line manager, manager or the ET team. I would however stress that the ET team is very small and given the growing number of ET that Mace is taking on, support may not always be available or to the appropriate level to support those in need.

Mace’ company culture and general atmosphere was very friendly, it was not uncommon to see Mace directors in the office and those who were higher up within the company were always very welcoming and pleasant. Mace itself has quite a formal atmosphere in terms of office culture and dress sense but this uniformity brings everyone together. Mace also has an open culture of supporting others and encourages that if you are working within Mace on a project that is not enjoyable to you then to speak up and solutions will be made.

The placement experience at Mace was enjoyable in the end. Once I had got up to speed and picked up responsibilities that I could have week on week my time at Mace went very quickly. However upon joining Mace my enjoyment was very low as I was given low responsibility and the project did not know how to best utilise me hence resulting in low levels of work to complete and some long empty periods of time with no work.

Yes

Those applying to Mace should make sure they have a thorough understanding of the role they are applying to. I say this as it is important to understand the role you have applied to and the role you work as so that expectation and experience can be compared. I would also suggest having a good understanding of the sector you are applying to at Mace as some sectors may be of greater interest to the individual applying.