Technical Industrial Placement Review

Software development on an Agile project developed for a client - my days generally consist of Agile ceremonies (including daily stand-up meetings, refinements, and sprint retrospectives) and focused time working on the codebase. Development activities vary through the sprint, but generally include working on new frontend/backend code, fixing bugs, reviewing other people's code, testing the code to ensure no regression or new accessibility deficits, and demonstrating the feature changes to the client for feedback before merging the changes into the main codebase.

Lots of responsibility: being able to develop functionality that becomes a part of the main production codebase, being relied upon to demonstrate the new functionality directly to the client (and extended client stakeholder group) to receive feedback, and being involved in the quality assurance/review process to approve other people's code. Within the internal group project, there were no pre-assigned roles, so I had the opportunity to develop my leadership skills. I was also responsible for organising and delivering key Social Value activities.

Gained familiarity with a huge range of languages and frameworks, including Angular and typescript, as well as an understanding of Agile methodologies and code development (CI/CD pipelines) in industry. Improved my communication, time management, leadership and presentation skills, through working on an internal group project with other early careers students, where we had to present our idea and progress to senior members of the organisation several times throughout the year. This has also helped me network with vast numbers of people, both internally and externally.

Lots of formal and informal support and guidance, from other people on the development team (who helped me learn and improve my technical experience) as well as my line managers who helped shape my soft-skills development. Also received support from mentors external to my main project - everyone has been willing to help!

A really supportive and friendly company culture. My project was a remote project, but people from my team based at the same office would come in once a week to work together, which has been really helpful for meeting others. There is no pressure to work beyond your contracted/expected hours, and lots of recognition for when you do things well - but equally, lots of support when you might be struggling. Everyone (even those not on the same project) is really friendly, they have good technical experience across a range of areas, but always willing to teach you or help you grow. Lots of social events that you can get involved in (with your project team, and beyond), but no pressure to either.

I have loved every moment of my placement. The project work itself has been very interesting, and I have learnt loads. But the company culture and the team have made it an enjoyable place to work. Working closely with the client to shape the project outcome has been valuable, as this is not something you can do with university coursework - you rarely get a chance to improve your solution according to feedback once it's "complete".

Yes