Access Network Engineering Manager Review

As Access Network Engineering Manager I am required to provide leadership, management, support and development of the Access Network Engineering team who are responsible to build, upgrade, develop, operate, maintain and support the Access IP Network at TalkTalk. This position is responsible for the day to day management of both networks and staff within the group, ensuring the department adheres to SLA's, projects are delivered on time, to budget and operational issues are resolved effectively and efficiently.

The first unit we completed was Operations & Technology Management and that was very much in touch with my day to day role, so it was good to be able to use my experience within technology and build upon it. The second unit is Sales & Marketing and it is an area I know nothing about so it has enabled me to learn new skills and theory, reach out to people internally at TalkTalk who I may not have been in contact had I not been on the apprenticeship, form new working relationships with new peers and further develop.

I do enjoy the programme. I must admit the first unit was overall delivered better than the second unit, but this is due to COVID and cannot be avoided. We are all now working remotely but the lack of face to face and breakout sessions do limit learning somewhat. A key part of the programme is to learn from your peers and at present we are not able to do so as much. Its unavoidable of course and we hope to get back to university for the next unit, but I am not sure if we should have delayed the unit...

The structure of the first unit was good, a couple of webinars to get you going, followed buy a four day classroom block backed up with a couple of further webinars and assignment support. The second unit (due to COVID) has not been as structured as it is very difficult to focus on video based learning for such large chunks of the day, without the peer interaction that can be obtained only from face to face learning.

My direct line manager, who is also my mentor is himself on a degree apprenticeship programme, so is supportive. Getting time off work is fairly easy to continue with my studies or assignments but my own time management lets me down as I seem to fall back into work even during this time. I need to be stricter and make best use of my time, all of this will come with experience as I develop through the degree.

The University, the lecturers and skills coach are all very supportive. There is sufficient detail about what is needed for each unit, assignment, skill or whatever it maybe and it is mostly backed up with theory as to why! We've had a testing time through COVID and some last minute adjustments to timetables have been made which hasn't been ideal but is understandable. Hopefully once we are out of the other side the schedule will be more fixed.

Having worked at TalkTalk Group as a People Manager for a couple of years I am now looking to broaden my managerial skillset through external training. I believe this will provide necessary rounding to my personal profile and will enable me to apply new learnings into my role and the workplace as a whole. A lot of managers within TalkTalk have done similar managerial degree programmes and have all reported that the skills and added experience gained has been beneficial to them both personally and professionally. I am looking to extend my own learning portfolio and feel that having gained some experience and learnings from my peers and superiors now is the right time to do so through professional certification. I hope to be able to use these learnings to allow me to take future steps within my career.

Yes

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