Maintenance Associate Review

As a mature maintenance apprentice my working placements are within the Press Shop and Sub-Assembly areas of BMW Plant Swindon. My day-to-day roles include maintaining and fault finding on automotive machinery such as; Press lines and Robot work cells to ensure that they run as efficiently as possible. During these maintenance activities I am at times required to manually control automotive robots and make adjustments to Robot programs, which is really interesting.

I have learnt a wealth of new skills during my apprenticeship including manual and machining skills such as; hand fitting, turning and milling. Whilst learning these skills I have learnt the importance and the ability of producing parts to a high quality and to very small tolerances. At NVQ & BTEC I have learnt the theories behind and the produced practical installations of powered systems, such as; Fluid power (Pneumatics & Hydraulics), electrical systems and electronic systems. During BTEC I have also learnt how produce high quality reports (and the formulae required) on engineering subjects such as; Mechanical Principles, Electronic Principles & Mechanical Measurement.

I have thoroughly enjoyed the apprentice programme provided to me by BMW Plant Swindon. From the opportunity to improve myself from learning new skills and from the confidence building that I have gained from apprentice events. Having a better understanding of engineering disciplines will help me in becoming more of an asset to the company in the future. Meeting and working with other apprentices of different age groups has been great especially when being able to impart some of my experiences and helping them, but also their enthusiasm has inspired me.

I am grateful to BMW to have been given the opportunity to better myself especially as I am a mature apprentice. It is a testimony to BMW that they are willing to invest in mature students as well as looking to future generations. In BMW Plant Swindon the majority of employees have over twenty years service to the company which in itself shows how once employees get the chance to work for BMW they want to stay a forge a career.

The BMW apprenticeship needs to be well organised/structured due to the volume of learning required. In my experience I have found that although there is a lot to learn the flow of subjects being taught between NVQ and BTEC is structured well to allow the learning and assigned work to be completed in a timely manner.

The training provider on the BMW apprenticeship provides support in the form of training reviews that are regularly performed to ensure any issue the apprentices may have are dealt with efficiently. The training provider also ensures apprentices are coping with the demands of the course including keeping up with the workload and whether they are happy with the learning techniques provided.

I receive a great deal of support from my employer and in particular the placement managers who aid me in making learning within the manufacturing environment worthwhile and the apprentice manager who ensures that the apprentices get what they need from the learning provider. I myself have also witnessed the apprentice manager support apprentices in problems that may be related to issues outside of work to ensure that they do not negatively impact on their apprenticeship. My employer has also been accepting and encouraging of any ideas that apprentices may have to improve the apprenticeship in the future.

The BMW apprentice salary/package is very generous and allows for day-to-day living costs to be met which in turn allows apprentices to concentrate on learning without the stress of money worries. As a mature apprentice with a family and mortgage I have been able to maintain a good lifestyle whilst further bettering myself, which will enhance the opportunities to earn more in the future. For younger apprentices earning whist learning gives you an opportunity to start saving for the future whilst getting more qualified now.

When becoming a BMW apprentice I was able to partake in a team building exercise at ‘Skerne Lodge’. The activities at Skerne not only helped me with my abilities to work with others but it also built my own self-confidence and made me feel that I could do anything (this was particular helpful before starting the apprenticeship). I have also had the opportunity to represent BMW at career events in schools and perform process improvement activities with students. I have found both of these types of events to help me in improving my presenting skills and have found these events to be extremely gratifying.

Yes

Being a mature apprentice I have been in a position where I have be able to recommend the apprenticeship to colleagues who I have previously worked with. The reason for my recommendation is that I personally have gained so much in knowledge and experience that have made me a better and stronger person, but also the apprenticeship has sent me on a path that will lead to me becoming even more of an asset to the company, by having a further understanding and ability to aid in helping maintain BMW’s high standards now and to be part of the further improving of those standards in the future

I would advise candidates applying for the apprenticeship to firstly read the application carefully and ensure that any of the stipulated criteria required such as references and work experiences are correctly included (failure to do this may have a detrimental effect on your application). I would also suggest that it would be prudent to start reading up on engineering disciplines such as mechanical applications to get an understanding of how things work and the types of components and the ‘terms’ used (this background knowledge can aid in better understanding the learning from the lecturers).