Rating

6.9/10
  • 1. Please give an overview of your role and what this involves on a day-to-day basis:
  • My role was mainly shadowing a member of the IT department. His role required using the programming language SQL and I had some knowledge of that so I was given some small exercises to perform using my knowledge but also using some of the data from the database. Since I was only there for one week I was mainly shadowing and just there to see what he did on a day to day as opposed to doing any real work.

    9/10

  • 2. Have you learnt any new skills or developed existing skills?
  • I learnt about what IT people actually do on a day to day basis. I had been doing IT at school but wasn't sure how those skills were used in the workplace. I met with his boss who explained a little about how things worked in their department. I also developed my SQL skills- learning new commands and also being able to peek into a huge database that they used was pretty intresting.

    8/10

  • 3. To what extent do you enjoy your programme?
  • I really enjoyed it- the person was one of my parent's colleagues so that was nice. Everyone else I met was also super friendly. He always kept it fun for me and gave me some tasks that were challenging but not too hard so that I wouldn't be able to do them. I think this helped as I felt more motivated to do them knowing I could actually finish it as opposed to having no clue what I was doing. Also with everyone being so nice I was able to ask questions more freely about what they actually did day to day and stuff

    5/10

  • 4. How valued do you feel by NHS?
  • Not very- it wasn't a very long programme so I didn't really feel valued. However that wasn't their fault as I was only there for a week but I think that the environment I was in was great and made it super easy to ask questions and learn things about their work and SQL

    8/10

  • 5. How well organised/structured is your programme?
  • There wasn't that much structure but it was fairly well organised. They had things for me to do most of the time such as litttle SQL exercises to do. They also let me meet some of the other people in the office and ask them questions as well as meeting the boss who gave me some tasks to do too.

    8/10

  • 6a. How much support do you receive from your training provider?
  • I didn't receive any training. I went into the programme with some knowledge of the programming language SQL and that is what I primarily used during my week there. They helped introduce me to more SQL commands over the week but that was all. As a byproduct of meeting so many people during the week I suppose I learned how to meet people in a more formal setting.

    6/10

  • 6b. How much support do you receive from your employer?
  • I didn't receive any support. As mentioned before, this was a one week work experience with the NHS mainly shadowing a member of staff in the IT department so no support was given and that was fine with me and also my school as I was doing this as part of work experience week.

    8/10

  • 7. How well does your salary/package meet your costs?
  • There was no salary involved. I was merely shadowing a member of staff in the IT department at a hospital. I had to pay for my own travel card. I had to use the train and then the tube for a journey of around 2 hours. My parents gave me the money to pay for a weekly travel card.

    3/10

  • 8. Are there many opportunities outside of work?
  • I didn't work there and at the time I was studying at a local selective grammar school 6th form for my first year of a levels. I was doing this work experience as part of the work experience week whereby they encouraged everyone in year 12 to get 2 weeks of work experience. I ended up being accepted into a computer science experience week at a university so I only did one week of work experience.

    7/10

  • 9. Would you recommend NHS to a friend?
  • Yes


  • 9b. Why?
  • Because it was enlightening. I was able to learning things about being in a real workplace that you can't learn in a classroom. Things like formally meeting people and introducing yourself, real life databases and other projects that people are actually using and relying on to do their jobs and also experiencing getting up and "working" a 9-5 job and commuting was intresting too.


  • 10. What tips or advice would you give to others applying to NHS?
  • I got this job through my parents as they also worked there too so I'm not sure how that would be useful unless your parents were affiliated with other NHS workers. However there are formal internships and work experiences in place for students of all ages so even if it's only a week I'd say to take it and learn as much as you can about the real world of jobs.


Details

Work Experience

Information Technology

Central London & City

July 2017


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