Data Services Apprentice

“It’s not like a normal apprenticeship – it’s more like having a job.”

The first thing that surprised me when I joined Accenture was how in-depth my role was from day one. I grew up around technology my whole life (my dad is a technology fan!) and I did a two year IT course as part of my GCSEs plus one year of an IT NVQ within college, but I really only ever learned the basics. It was a whole other world when I started here.

At the moment, I work directly with one of our clients, writing code to fix any problems that come up with customers, helping in their transfers, and updating their websites, but when I joined, I had no experience writing code at all. When I was assigned to my first project, I was just shocked with how complicated it looked, but the people here are so friendly and supportive that I had help from one of the senior managers, my manager and another girl on the apprenticeship programme with me.

I’ve been really surprised by how relaxed all my senior colleagues are. They’re always happy to answer our questions and they really make time to talk. We’re all kept up to date on what’s happening and how well we’re doing with clients which is really important – and they’re always up for giving advice. Accenture’s really good at getting in new people and younger people too – and settling them in well.

Not only is the programme a great place to start a career within IT, it is really flexible too. We get a day-release for college which helps with the large workload, and soon I’ll start working towards a foundation degree with Northumbria University which is really exciting.

It’s obvious that this apprenticeship isn’t just about getting a job – it’s actually about getting a degree and finishing college and developing into a well-rounded person. I was quite shy when I first started, but now I’m moving in to a flat with some of the others from my apprenticeship group! I get along really well with the people here and I am so much more confident now than I was before. We’ve become a good group of friends both inside and outside of work; we even go out together at weekends.

On the programme, we do real work with real clients, so I certainly feel that I’m contributing good work to the team. There’s also an awful lot you can do within Accenture in Newcastle, so I’m planning to learn more about different roles within the company. At the end of the apprenticeship I’d like to be in Application Development, hopefully doing design work. Next on my list is getting stuck in to my courses at Northumbria University – I’ve heard from other apprentices in the previous start group that it’s really challenging and interesting, and I can’t wait!