Electrical Substation Engineer Review

Substation Engineer Trainee. My time is equally spent between training at the National Grid Academy, learning at Aston University and on the job training at Ninfield 400kV Substation.

The Higher Apprenticeship is largely based on developing new skills. National Grid have invested in a great deal of time and money to train employees. With a great deal of external courses provided. It will be interesting to see what the retention will be like as so many new skills/courses are run almost back to back.

I find Learning new skills is always enjoyable and working with industry hardened professionals at the substations is always a laugh. As I live 200 miles away from both the university and the National Grid Academy much of my time is spent driving, with an ever increasing workload I easily double my contractual hours and therefore any social life / family time is very limited at the moment.

I feel very valued by the Academy training team, my mentor, substation team leader as well as the great guys I work on-site with.

I can fully appreciate the difficulty in running such a varied and complex programme. The programme works very well in general, however there are some serious pinch points which with a little thought could have been easily avoided.

The support I have received from the Academy team and the Substation team has been truly inspirational. Specifically the New Talent Development Specialist has gone above and beyond time after time.

Math support was granted.

If contractual hours were worked then the salary would be good. Hotels and meals are paid for when studying at the University. A company car is the most important part of the package, I have so far racked in excess of 13000 miles since November and would deem the company car as essential.

With the current workload and limited time available there are no opportunities outside of work.

Yes

The training offered by National Grid is second to none. Once the higher apprenticeship is completed it will offer vast and lucrative opportunities in the Electrical Power Industry.

This apprenticeship will only suit individuals who are prepared to work most of their evenings, weekends and some holiday time. If your applying from further afield then be prepared to drive a considerable amount of time during your apprenticeship.