Commercial Manager - Selling Review

I experienced massive highs, mixed with awful lows. A really varied year.

first 6 months did not feel valued at all. As a progressed through my placement and built relationships with my team I built a network of collegues who really valued eachother

mixed. first line manager provided little support despite my desire to gain feedback and build on this, I felt i was purposely not provided opportunities in order to let other graduates shine through on occasion and blackmarked for situations unrelated to me in order to shift blame. my second line manager was completely different and we worked great in an open and honest environment, who truly helped me develop.

you always feel like there is too little hours in the day to get all of your jobs done. this is great on occasion, makes thr day go quick and you can gain a real sense of achievement at times. however other times you feel overworked, and no matter how late you stay on or how hard you have worked you are left feeling by the team like this is not good enough and at times unappreciated for the hard work you have done.

m&s in great in terms of providing fantastic opportunity and responsibility. i was given a department from day one, managing section managers and a team of 30 colleagues. i have experienced the responsibility of performance managing colleagues, doing disciplinarys, making big decisions about my team... if you want responsibility this is a fantastic placement.

i will take both the good and bad experiences and will most definitely use to further my studies and career. i have learnt so much from the company in terms of both skills and competencies as well as performance in a business environment which will no doubt help me in the future. you really do learn an awful lot from m&s

again varied through year due to management changes. however in general a very low morale from team, team did not work well together and politicly there was a negative atmosphere towards each other. however this may be specific to the store i was in and have heard great things about other training stores in terms of management teamwork and support.

from a business perspective the placement is very well structured, and while you will not follow the programme exactly to the book, this is the nature of retail and you will always be given opportunity to cover aspects which partiularily interest you. the company set up 15 training sessions a year of which you go to london and provide courses on aspects which will help you develop as a manager.

the company invest alot in you, in terms of courses and opportunity. cannot fault at all.

if this is the job you are looking for, future prospects are very good if you want to return. (providing your face fits)

nor particularily in terms of placement students as they are scattered across the UK, but built up a good social circle in my store.

on par with majority of uk,

good nightlife, easy to go out after work

not really anything business orientated, your placement experience is what you make it.