Junior Project Manager Review

My role involves supporting the project managers on one of the banks largest applications with their day to day delivery. As well as this, i have various responsibilities of my own to manage. These include managing technical change deliveries and accounting for/fixing numerous technical issues that we face on our infrastructure.

Yes, although i was coming into employment here with very little in terms of tangible workplace skill. I certainly have developed my interpersonal skills through initial workplace experience. In terms of more specific hard skills, although i have found that on more than one occasion "on the job" training was sorely lacking, i have been able to work with others in order to boost my skills of that nature.

At this moment in time, i am fortunate enough to work alongside some individuals that I enjoy spending time with and enjoy working with. However, that is only a recent development. At various times in my apprenticeship, I would have spoken the complete opposite of what I have done. The aforementioned colleagues have not been around for my entire time here and circumstance bought us together but my prior experience here has not been so pleasant.

The programme runs an interesting juxtaposition between an incredibly well structured approach which really get the best out of apprentices and a dis organised mess which serves to give apprentices an awful start to working life. To delve into both points, the central "apprenticeship team" do a fantastic job of ensuring that the apprentices on their programme are looked after and supported. They make clear the opportunities to progress and they really make sure that we're looked after. This is in direct contrast to my experience once out of that team however and with my direct colleagues (or former colleagues in this case). The apprentice team put you with your new colleagues and make you aware of the support they can offer, but if your new team are not equipped to deal with a new apprentice then they can often overlook, mistreat and fully disillusion you. I know of several former employees who have left for this reason and i was almost one of them. Many employees who decide to take on an apprentice are not aware of the fact that it is a massive overhead and end up jeopardising the future career of said apprentice as a result. The organisation and fluidity of your programme wholly depends on the team you end up with, which is not acceptable for such a massive scheme. I am rating 5 out of 10, with a split of 10/10 for the apprentice team but 0/10 for the way this is intergrated into workplace life.

This is very subjective, it depends who you report to and what area you're in. In my experience as an apprentice here, i have worked under people who are incredibly supporting and can't do enough to help but I have also worked under individuals who seemingly forgot I even worked for them. The central apprenticeship team however, has always been a beacon of support when needed.

My training provider was very helpful, the tutor i was assigned worked with me on both my mandated classroom days and when visiting the office too. They helped break the course down into manageable sub sections and made it seem very simple. I have no complaints about the help I received from my tutor (s)

I think that my role and my training through the training provider were wholly unrelated. This experience will not speak for every apprentice as I know of several who benefited from it but in my experience, what I was learning (whilst interesting and useful in a more general sense) did not relate to my day to day work in my job.

There is a multitude of activities to get involved with. These range from sports teams to social events, skill building clubs, exercise teams etc. The location that I work at is not an isolated case either, I believe that most (if not all) of the locations that Barclays run have got many of these opportunities.

No

That question is far too subjective! As an employee of a non apprentice, coming in to do a specific job, yes I would recommend them. For an already established industry professional it would be a wonderful place to work. However for an apprentice, as a result of my own horrendous mismanagement from day 1, I would not recommend them. I should state that this view is specific to me, and I have many friends who have succeeded here (more than i know who haven't). However, the experience is not standardised across the board and there is no guarantee of success. Should the positive apprentice experience become standard across the company, my view would change

I would advise other potential employees to have a clear view in mind of what they would like to achieve in their career. That way, should their application be a success, they can best go about finding out where they want to work within the organisation and the best way of getting here. I would not advise it for a first "real" job but for those with workplace experience and a clear vision of what they want from their career, keep those goals in mind and actively work towards them