Commercial Vehicles Finance Analyst Review

I found my placement year with Vauxhall challenging but also enjoyable. The work was really interesting and gave a great insight into how the company works.

I was made to feel very welcome by the colleagues in my office. They were always very firendly and happy to help with any questions I had. Everyone was easy to get along with which helped me settle in quickly.

As stated above, everyone in the office was always happy to help me with any issues, this included my manager. Throughout the year I worked closely with my manager he has helped me produce some really high level work.

Most days I had enough to do to fill the day. Even when the regular work dried up the occasional time there was always something I could find to work on.

I was given much more responsibility than I initially thought I would have. As I grew into the role, I gained more trust, I was then set more work which gained greater visibility higher up the company.

My role was largely based on data analysis, I believe this will help in some aspect of my degree. Also, Vauxhall has helped me improve my presentation skills, as throughout the year we had to give presentations to our management stating what work we have undertaken and what our future goals are. I believe the skills gained will assist me in any future job, I have had to learn quickly new computer programmes and have learned how to get the most out of Excel, this will certainly help me in future jobs. This year has also given me great examples I will be able to use when applying for gard schemes and will hopefully give me the upper hand in applications.

The atmosphere in my office helped me quickly settle in. While working, everyone is professional and working well but they are also friendly and willing to help if I had any questions. During coffee breaks everyone in the office are able to chat and joke with eachother.

The whole year, from initial aplications to the final week of work were really well organised. Vauxhall have run the undergraduate programme for a number of years, with that exerience know exactly how to run it.

There were a number of workshops (mainly at the start of the year) that are there to assist you and help improve your skills, these have included, IT, Excel, Presentation and Graduate Application Skills. We then had a number of presentations to the managers in our department, in which we had to state the major work we have undertaken and what our targets are for the future.

There is no actual grad scheme at Vauxhall. With Opel/Vauxhall recovering and aiming for profitability this may improve in the future. At the moment, they have said the best of the undergrads may b earmarked and kept hold of incase a role that they would fit into opens up in the future, however there is no guarentee.

Each year Vauxhall employ around 100 undergraduates, in the first 2 weeks everyone lives in the University of Bedfordshire halls and within this time they need to find a house to live in for the year, this creates a very good social scene amongst the placement students.

The houses in Luton are relatively cheap to rent.

Vauxhall offer lots of things to get involved in and are regularly emailed out.