Analyst Review

The people were mostly brilliant but the work got a bit tedious as it was mostly solo work.

Always enjoyed social events, was asked for my opinion on various matters and also received good feedback and more work whenever i completed a task.

The fortnightly chat with the team leader was all I really got. Never spoke to management, doubt they knew who I even was. On a team level though it was better. When it came to work I was supervised well.

Really varied. In some weeks I had too much work in others I had absolutely nothing to do. I always asked for more work when I had nothing to do but this was never really dealt with (other than with one exception) by my team leader. I had to go directly to people and ask for work or I would sit at my desk with nothing to do.

When I had work to do I was given sole responsibility over the work.

Gained useful life skills by living alone, other than that I can't really think of much. The courses that I got to go on were insightful.

When people weren't complaining about stuff (which was rare!) and sometimes even when they were the atmosphere was brilliant in my team. The only fault I can think of is that if they spent less time complaining about how much work they had to do they might actually get some of it done...

Took far too long for my security clearance to come through and confirmation of my placement. After being told that I had the job and just needed my security clearance to come through in February/march I heard nothing until UNDER A MONTH before I start the placement at which point if the clearance didn't come through I wouldn't have gotten into uni. The first three weeks of work for every new starter was filled with reading random documents because we either had no work or we had no access to the systems that we needed to I order to do any work. After that it was quite interesting, my team clearly needed a YINI (or just manpower) because they were so understaffed but hit hey didn't know what they wanted to use me on. I was meant to spend 50% of my time on cost projects however I received around 1-2 weeks work max all year on costs.

They sent me on plenty of courses and to many conferences which I cannot fault. It would have been nice to go on trials though.

After not receiving a sponsorship because the department manager said that they didn't have the budget, which was reasonable I suppose, it is unlikely that I will return to DSTL. The fact that it took the department manager around 2 months to come to this decision which I needed ALOT sooner than I received it (which seems to be a recurring theme with DSTL) did them no favours.

Many YINIS/placement students/graduates. Had a brilliant social life with colleagues outside of work.

Pretty good. I am good at saving money but everything was very affordable.

There were at least 10 pubs on the road just off my street. Also many local bars/pubs/clubs, a casino and much more. (Oh and a massive beach).

Work had a few clubs and sporting activities but I didn't know of many graduates or younger that got involved in them. There were plenty of local clubs and societies to join however, to my regret, I didn't get very involved in them.