Business Affairs Assistant aka Chartered Manager Apprentice Review

I am currently within my first placement which is within the BBC's Business Affairs Team. I work with Independent companies to negotiate the Licence Fee and contractual terms for Programmes, this required good communication and has allowed me to develop skills. I draft contracts, financial paperwork and advise on clearances of clips from a legal perspective. I have a large amount of responsibility within the team, having my own programmes to look after myself as been a great experience.

Since being in my first role I have learnt so many valuable skills. I have learnt how to develop my communication, I have developed my ability to create excel documents. I have developed my financial and legal knowledge. I have also learnt brand new skills of negotiation, sending out offers of a price, and then working down and negotiating the deal as been a really exciting skill to learn that I feel will be invaluable to me.

I enjoy my scheme to a strong extent - my placement has offered me so much experience and provided me with so many opportunities that has really helped me to kick start my career and feel comfortable with own abilities within the workplace. I do things on a daily basis I never thought I would do, and this invaluable to me and my development. The academic learning side of the course is also good - it takes getting used to as it is very different to previous forms of education. But overall it has been enjoyable.

There is good structure - however there is room for improvement based on observation. Overall the structure is good and has been handles well. However days at university and having planned dates for things to happen could use some work. We often feel like we don't know what is going on and it could be improved with further clarity. But on the whole structure is good.

My line manager within my placement is very supportive and I have weekly catch up's with her to see how I'm coping and what I've been doing which is good. I also see my scheme manager every so often which is good as another point of contact for support.

Our skills coach meets with us once a term and is also available via email or text message if we were to have an issue. The support is sufficient and we know if we need more support it is available to us at any time. During workshop days we also receive a good amount of support on our questions.

It is not exactly applicable, as I am not in a role of management, and at times my course is very hard to apply as it focuses on management and using management in practice. So often in my current role it does not help, but going forward I hope it will pay off.

There are occasionally networking events that we can attend, for example a young people youth panel that put on networking events, there are often team drinks that provide networking opportunities. The BBC offers the BBC Club that can be used to network for a paid subscription. Also QA have networking days that have been good.

Yes

Its been a great experience, that has allowed me to further my education as well as getting hands on experience in the work place, allowing me to finish university with a degree and three years worth of work place experiences making me a valuable candidate to any future role, benefitting me more than any classroom degree.

To be yourself, prepare for interview by reading the BBC values and the challenges we face. To be apart of the BBC, you have to know the BBC and understand what we do and what we are about. Being invested in the product goes a long way - so become interested in the company and the goals before you apply.