Trainee Developer Review

My day to day role included reading program specs given to me by my senior developer, him talking through what the program was designed to do and me trying to code it with his support. I coded on a Z-series IBM mainframe and was supported through. I also had to code JCL to run the programs.

I was completely new to coding at the start of my apprenticeship and also new to the workplace. This meant that I learnt a number of both hard and soft skills. For example as mentioned above I learnt how to code on a mainframe but also my written and interpersonal skills have developed lots.

I really enjoyed my time as an apprentice, I had a great support network around me in the team and equally with other apprentices in other teams and different sites. I was given all the tools and training I needed to do my job and had a variety of responsibilities, meaning no 2 days were the same.

My programme was very well strucutred, my trainer/assessor came to visit me monthly and scored me out of 9 on a number of different topics. I had a member of my team support me with each section of the programme and this really helped me to integrate into the work family.

To Re-iterate what I said above, my employer was really supportive and I had a really good relationship with my boss. Being the only apprentice on my site I was able to travel whenever I wanted to meet up with other apprentices and allowed time off to study whenever I needed.

LearnDirect were a good training provider but not outstanding. They developed a portal which I could log on to at any time and it allowed me to see my progress. I was left to my own devices in terms of support but I didn't mind this and my assessor was always on hand to help whenever I needed.

I actually feel like the qualification I recieved was quite basic for an IT role, whilst I was coding etc the qualification focused more on using the basic microsoft packages etc. I think this would have been a good thing for someone that was not in an IT focused role.

We get the opportunity to attend a number of professional networking events but nothing too social. There is a big difference in the age demographic between me and the other team members so we have our annual Christmas meal but that's about it. There is a football field out the back and a games room for social lunches.

Yes

Very competitive pay, great training opportunities and a great place to work. We get a good pension contribution and the ability to buy shares at a discounted rate. There is also a wide support network for things ranging from helping you save to helping eliminate back pain. A great company.

Show that you are willing to 'be moulded' in the sense that you might know how to do something, but do you know the Lloyds way to do it? If you show that you are willing and eager to learn as well as friendly and approachable, you shouldn't have any problems!