IT Intern Review

I very much enjoyed my year at Flowserve, I got involved with many different aspects of which made up my University Degree. They understood what I was going to benefit from because they had a few years previous experience which placement students who completed the same degree as mine, finally the people I was involved with treated me in a professional manner and at the same time understood I was there to learn just as much as I was to work, they were very patient with my development.

I was positioned in the IT department, a room just off the main pool. I was made to feel very welcome here and my relationship with these people was both a business one and a friendship. From this I was able to perform my work in a relaxed environment and produce results which benefitted the team. I was also part of a global team where I would be involved in weekly conferences, even here I was valued as a full team member and would be given a lot of healthy responsibility.

My managers were very accustom to Placement Students and because of their wealth of experience within the company they were able to show were I was going right and also where I required assistance and guidance. Regular meetings provided the time to let our ideas be known and to see what stage I was progressing at.

I was given a very reasonable time balance, I was given three major projects within my duration and it was up to me to arrange meetings and time needed to complete each project. there would be the occasional stage where I had some free time due to other team members needing to complete their tasks, when I got free time I would contact my main manager/sponsor and he would be able to set me up working with different departments to extend my reach of the company and contacts.

I was given a lot of healthy responsibility, I was in charge of the project management, system analysis and development/testing of on two of my projects, the third I was more of a supporting member because SAP was not something I could take the lead in but even still I had to arrange meetings, training, changes to the system and a training document.

I have already witnessed the benefits my year at Flowserve gave me, I have been receiving much improved grades so far within my third year, this is due to me being a lot more confident and experienced with the degrees aspects which I practiced day in day out at my placement. My communication skills are also improved when speaking to team members, lecturers and job vacancies. Finally my organisation skills have been greatly upgraded, I have realised this because I have been planning and structuring my work this third year very professionally and on time

The atmosphere in my office was very positive, we would be able to work together in a professional manner whenever an issue was raised within related projects, aside from this socially everyone was very friendly and approachable, everyone was interested in what you did outside of work.

I found my placement 'seamless' because of their previous experience with students doing the same degree as me, they had their activities set up for me well in advance, the equipment I was given was very high spec and up to date so I had no trouble performing my tasks Finally with the other employees participating in my projects and meetings I had no set backs with performing my job.

I was able to pick up many valuable skills including SAP, Presentational Skills, Project management skills, SharePoint, Training Skills. My training was provided by members of staff who have very high experience in the respective fields

Flowserve is an engineering firm, so the IT side of the industry does not have a huge amount of positions internally, however being employed to run projects and analyse what the company needs system wise to improve staffs everyday productivity I feel there is some opportunities for this.

I was able to make some very good friends out of the fellow placement students, they worked within the engineering department, and we would regularly sit at lunch together along with other younger workers. Where we all lived in Brighton we was able to socialise outside of work in town, over the course of the year we eventually decided to all live together during our final year at university which was a surprising but very nice result.

I lived in Brighton because I studied here for two years prior to placement and it is a very vibrant city, I commuted to Hayward's heath which was half an hour on the train. the cost of house sharing with 5 of us in a nice house was £380 a month which was acceptable, my travel was too expensive either.

The nightlife in Hayward's heath was not great, we would occasionally go the their local pubs which were very nice but a good night out was spent I Brighton where we all the students stayed, and you cannot go wrong in Brighton!

I was involved playing football with a large number of staff at the company that was my only outside activity.