Software Engineer Review

I've been in training in Manchester for the first 4 months of this apprenticeship. The training involves intensive learning with the knowledge and experience of the trainers guiding you through it. Lots of different technical knowledge was learnt and implementing it through different tasks, and different project work over the 4 months. The training doesn't only train in technical learning, but also client facing side of our job, training through the form of presentations.

I didn't know any coding whatsoever before coming to Manchester for training. After 4 months, I have the capability to build fully deployed, full stack, working applications. This just shows the technical depth that the trainers will dive into and teach you. Never before have I learnt such a vast, wide range of knowledge and been able to understand and implement it, in such a short space of time.

Most enjoyable experience in any sort of teaching area I've ever had. The trainers will take the time out of their days to really sit down for hours with you individually and explain concepts to you, just so you can understand it. BAE really know how to select a good bunch of cohort members too, working with likeminded individuals who all get on is a very enjoyable experience.

Very. At the start of the program we were layed out the plan for the teaching regime, and they stuck to it completely. QA (technical teaching company) managed to teach us every technology they were meant to, at a very deep level. They also gave us the freedom to use other technologies for project work, if we wanted to.

A lot of support. BAE were always checking in on us in Manchester and travelled up to visit us quite a lot during the 4 months. They travelled up to meet us all, to take us out for meals, and to watch our project presentations. BAE always made themselves available to reach out to if we had any questions.

Outstanding support. QA went above and beyond for every member of our cohort. They would be easily reachable if any questions were needed to be asked, freely available during the day to sort out any problems we had programming wise. They gave us all the support we needed, and our trainer was just the best, even giving up his weekend to open the academy for us that wanted to do some more project work.

I wouldn't be any where near as good at coding as I am now, without the training provided by QA Consulting. They allowed us to explore which job roles we most enjoyed in software engineering, gave us the freedom to explore which technologies we liked most and this all helps us perform better in our job role.

At BAE, there are quite a lot of social clubs. These can be found on the companies intranet home page. I've had a little look at it so far and it seems like there is a wide range of social activities such as climbing, and team things to do, company wide.

Yes

Even if you don't like coding or programming (I didn't think I did before I started it in training), it's such a rewarding job to have. BAE Systems is a company that cares about it's employees and really takes care of us. The work is beyond interesting and will most likely never get boring, it will however always be challenging, which is a good thing because that way you are always learning something new. There is an aspect of a tight knit community here because we work closely in teams, very good place to work.

Don't be afraid to put new ideas out there. BAE is a company that not only accepts, but welcomes innovation. Even if you don't know coding, don't be put off applying, if you like solving problems and learning new interesting things, Apply! Be honest, be bold, be yourself :)