Corporate Social Responsibility Associate Review

Item: Corporate Social Responsibility Associate at Samsung Electronics
Rating: 3.8
Author: Anonymous

at Samsung Electronics

Placement (10 Months+)

Marketing

Chertsey

Review Submitted: June 2021

Overall Rating

3.8 /5

The Overall Rating is the average of all the ratings given in each category. We take those individual ratings and combine them into one final score!

5/5 - Overview of Role

4/5 - Skills Development

3.5/5 - Support and Guidance

3.5/5 - Company Culture

4/5 - Overall Experience

3/5 - Future Career Prospects

Overview of Role

Please give an overview of your role and what this involves on a day-to-day basis.

Attending meetings with various agencies and partners; supporting on decisions, taking notes and driving agreed actions.
Planning and designing internal comms; integrating with wider external comms calendar.
Presenting volunteering campaigns to teams in the business.
Managing general team inbox.
Managing team admin; processing invoices, contracts and managing vendors.

Were you given much responsibility during your placement / internship?

Yes - nearly full responsibility of employee volunteering and internal comms for CSR. Often acting as spokesperson for Samsung on agency meetings discussing our flagship programme. Given autonomy handling partner invoices and legal agreements.

Please rate how meaningful the work you were doing was

5/5

Skills Development

Have you learnt any new skills, or developed your existing skills?

Developed skills: inter-personal skills, Microsoft packages, organisation
New skills: design, managing meetings, organising my inbox, understanding legal documents and invoices, marketing & general business vocabulary, understanding corporate culture

How would you rate the training provided during your experience?

2/5

How would you rate your development of industry-specific skills during the experience?

5/5

How would you rate your development of personal / soft skills during the experience?

4/5

Please rate how these skills have helped you in your career development

5/5

Support and Guidance

How much support and guidance did you receive during your placement / internship?

I was given as much guidance as my team could afford to give me (time-wise), but this wasn't enough. HR on-boarding was very generic with not all elements relevant to me. Several internal systems are very difficult to use and not enough training was given on these. It was assumed that I understood marketing vocabulary, advanced Microsoft processes, internal stakeholder relations when I did not (at least to begin with). Support improved from 3 month + period.

How would you rate the support and guidance from your line manager?

3/5

How would you rate the support and guidance from the wider team?

4/5

Company Culture

What was the company culture and general atmosphere like?

Very hip and trendy; up to date, very 'cool' company to do a placement.
Simultaneously very fast-paced and intense, with pulse surveys regularly reporting poor work/life balance. Some people were quite stressed as a result which I bore the brunt of a couple of times. Could be quite hierarchical: everything needs final approval and amends would always be made regardless of the quality of the original document.

How would you rate the inclusiveness of the culture?

4/5

How would you rate the social opportunities?

2/5

How would you rate the diversity initiatives?

4/5

How would you rate the charity, sustainability and corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives?

4/5

Overall Experience

To what extent did you enjoy your placement / internship?

I've gained invaluable experience; having to adapt to a fast-paced environment and learn a lot of new things on the spot and get up to speed quickly. I've been given a lot of autonomy and felt really trusted by my team halfway through the placement.
I didn't enjoy the intensity at times - back-to-back calls and working late into the evening. I also didn't enjoy having to deal with stressed, hierarchical stakeholders.