Managment Information Developer Review

I have really enjoyed my time at IBM. As my first long term job in a corporate environment I wasn't sure how I was going to adjust from university life but the whole experience has been fantastic.

I have felt valued by the team but to feel valued you have to be valuable. The work that I have done has been appreciated but it probably took around 3 months to settle into my core role and feel like I was delivering value and giving something tangible back to the team and company.

My team at IBM have been very supportive of my professional developement and allowed me to develop my year and adapt my role to suit my preferences as my skill and proficiency increased. There is also a great community feel, from THINK Fridays to lunch and learns, access to professional mentoring and the whole placement student network have all been great resources to developing my (previously non existent!) IT and big data skills.

The workflow was inconsistent but IBM also supports 'Giveback' which are extra responsibilities around your core role. By applying for various other roles I was always fairly busy, occasionally there were some manic weeks with deadlines for Giveback and my core role projects coinciding at quarter end and likewise there were times when I didn't have much work to do, particularly in the summer when a lot of the team was away, so I just used that time for training.

I started off with a lot of supervision from my task manager, then worked with less supervision, began to work independently, started working with off shore resources in a lead developer role and ended the year as a lead developer and joint product lead for an internal IBM data analysis tool. This involved working with stakeholders, managing and leading a team across different time zones and having real responsibility for developing the product, dealing with defects, tasks, user feedback and managing team-stakeholder relationships, particularly as the product was used by high end execs.

I feel like I've learnt more in one year at IBM than I did in two years of my university degree. It's a bluechip company, working professionally for a year gives your CV a huge boost and I've proven that I can adapt my skillset and learn complex new skills in a short space of time to deliver true value to a business. The most important thing I'm going to take away is the experiences which have proven a lot of transferable skills to other potential employers. I've also learnt a lot about managing my work load and planning tasks which should hopefully help in my final year of uni!

My team did a lot of remote working so my team office was sometimes a little dull. Having said that, the IBM location I was working (Hursley House) was awesome and had an almost 'campus' like feel to it, lots of geeky gadgets drones etc buzzing around at lunchtime, sports teams, and lots of other interns to chat to and get a coffee with.

Very professional, IBM have been doing this for years and it shows. Everyone was very experienced and I never had any issues with work placement setup. I wanted to delay my start date and extend my end date which they were happy to oblige.

My team worked a lot on transferring skills although this was sometimes a challenge when working remotely. e.g. if you had a defect you couldn't fix and needed help it could sometimes be a bit of a wait for a Skype call/ screen sharing sesh to work through the problem but this became less of an issue as time went on. The IBM placement scheme also put on specific events focused on employ-ability skills as well as careers and networking events.

I'm applying back to the grad scheme and would be interested in working for them, IBM is such a large company that there is a lot of variety in roles. I'm also looking at applying to other technology companies and potentially finance jobs as well.

Fellow placement students all lived around the same area around work and there was a good social scene. Because my job wasn't London based getting around without a car could be a bit of a pain but with a car it was good. We organized trips away like a ski-trip as well as camping holidays down to Cornwall, house parties etc.

Cheap compared to London.

Awful but fun. Southampton is a university town with enough bars and clubs but none of them were particularly mind-blowing.

IBM does a lot of volunteering in the community and you can sign up to lists to get involved. I helped to run a team of fellow interns teaching IT skills to pupils at a local primary school and was given time off to run a TEDx event at my university.