Telecommunications engineer Review

On a day to day basis I am responsible for the preparation of new fibre cable installation in to the existing Openreach network. I work in a team to provide the foundations of expanding the fibre network across the UK. I drive to different locations and am provided with everything I need.

I had no prior experience in telecommunications before joining Openreach. The training I have received from Openreach has been vast and varied, although I did find that buddying was the best way for me to learn as I am a kinetic learner and prefer to be hands on with my team.

I absolutely love my job. I was recommended to apply by a previous colleague who had recently joined and was enjoying his role so I followed his advice, applied and luckily got the job. I plan to stay working for Openreach for the rest of my working days until I retire.

My NVQ programme has had it's struggles. We were told initially that we had 12 months to complete the NVQ, but it took months before we were booked an NVQ day which caused some stress. We started with one NVQ assessor who had too many students due to a colleague being on maternity leave so he was very busy. We then had another NVQ assessor who was also extremely busy as there were still not enough NVQ assessors to manage the workload they had. I did feel unsupported at times due to lack of communications but we have pulled it back at the last minute.

My employer/manager has been brilliant in supporting me through my NVQ work. We have had as much time as we needed to complete our work and if we have had any issues we have been able to go to our manager with any questions we have had as well.

As previously stated, in the beginning we didn't feel that we were getting much support. The NVQ teachers have been absolutely swamped with the workload and most of us have felt that we were not getting the support we needed at times. This has improved towards the end of our 12 months.

I don't think that many of us feel that the majority of the work we have completed for our NVQ bears that much relevance to our role. As a cabler who works in a team and not with the public directly, many questions were about how to deal with the customer which were not relevant. Also modules to do with using email etc bear very little relevance to our day to day roles.

I am not aware of any sports teams within my particular team or patch at work but we have previously attended a team building day outside of work and will be planning another for a few weeks time. We feel spending time with each other outside of work strengthens our team.

Yes

I would recommend Openreach to any friend who was struggling to fit in the mould at a desk job. I have always preferred to be active in my work and to be outside with that is even better. Openreach have a great attitude to work/life balance, excellent opportunities and is a job for life.

I would advise anyone applying to Openreach to focus on the Health and Safety aspects of the job and prioritising the customer experience above all else. Both of these areas are what I focussed on when I was applying as I have previous experience with both and believe it is what secured me the position.