Apprentice Software Engineer Review

My role involves being involved into different aspects of the business: pairing with the other engineers, attending boot camps, preparing for the relevant exams and building portfolio, attending the company's events, attending the team's events. I also pair with the UX designers and analysts to get the overview of the whole software development cycle,

Software programming is a completely new field for me, so I learn every day something new. I also learnt a lot about how to work in a large business and integrate myself within the team. I learn how the business operates and what are the correct ways of building software.

I would say almost 10, however, there are some fields of the training programme and the training delivery that could be improved, especially, the communication between the company and training provider. I feel grateful for having this opportunity to learn and enjoy the social aspects of this programme where I can meet different people.

I would say 8 due to the reason above - a lack of communication between the training body and the business. It feels that there are many loose ends where the training body cannot make the programme to be as smooth as possible. The most important and general aspects of the scheme are well-organised, however, the secondary ones, such as some apprentices needing to do functional skills exam is not well planned.

I receive great help from my mentor who checks up on my development every day and is always willing to give me a hand. He also helps me to drive my development into the most productive way. My team has given to me mental support by welcoming me on my first day and staying interested in my development. I feel that I have a great relationship with everyone.

This has been a little shaky because some things needed to be asked for repeatedly, such as results from some of my exams. There has been a lot of ambiguity in terms of the preparation for these functional skills exams as initially, we were told that we would get full support but what happened at the end was that we had to prepare for them ourselves and put as the matter of fact that the exams happen at that certain date.

Since I did not have any prior knowledge about software development, every training helps. I wish there was a little bit more support provided by the company during our learning time at work. I believe that some of the goals I must achieve in my scheme, such as presenting a portfolio and writing a synoptic project are very beneficial, others like OCA exam make the whole programme a lot harder because it is not helping me to be a good programmer.

There are. Many classes, such as yoga and hiking. I also volunteered to be an Ethics Ambassador. Every two weeks our company holds Show and Tell for the engineering department in which anyone can participate. We do some team going out, such as Friday lunches. We also have some team workshops.

Yes

I believe that this company offers great support for someone like an apprentice. Even if not everything can go smoothly, the management tries to make your journey to be good. There are also many opportunities to try yourself in different roles, such as become an Ethics Ambassador, run a group/class, present a Show and Tell to the rest of peers, hold some of the events. I like the fact that it is a multi-cultural, multi-lingual company and I feel safe and comfortable here despite being a foreigner.

Be determined to get this apprenticeship even if you failed on your first attempt. Never give up and don't expect the things to be easy. This programme will involve lots of learning and sometimes, you may feel that your brain is "fried". However, this scheme is definitely worth working hard and gives you an enormous kick to improve yourself and start something new. Good luck!