Industrial placements

[BlueskyBluesea]

How are your DC getting on with arranging these? It seems like every placement is so competitive and really it is very lucky if a student is able to organise a placement that is relevant to their degree. Or do you have a son or daughter that found and completed a placement ....any advice gratefully appreciated ☺️

Son messaged today - has got through to 4th stage of the selection process for one of the big accountancy firms.

I assumed this must be the last stage where you get to talk to humans. No, it's an online group exercise. If you pass this, then you get to the final stage - assessment centre

Five rounds of selection for an internship is crazy IMO.

I suppose it's good practice, if they're likely to want to work in a sector which uses that approach for grad schemes and other positions.

The number of vacation scheme, placement year and graduate scheme positions made available by large corporates is small relative to overall demand, so they need some way to manage that process as efficiently and as fairly as possible from their perspective.

The five stage process is quite usual and whilst lacking much, if any, face-to-face contact until the later stages means a large number of people have the opportunity to apply and be assessed on the basis of performance in tests and observed group situations rather than simply by leveraging plum work experience etc to get through a much tighter 'one time' shortlisting filter which can tend to favour the well-resourced and the well-connected. So there are pluses and minuses.

If someone is successful in securing a vac scheme or placement year position, then they are often fast tracked to a full offer with few or no further hurdles. Even if not successful, they have built up the experience to help with their next shot. There are other sectors and other roles that do not employ these approaches, so there are choices to be made.

@PerpetualOptimist - is 5 really that usual though?

3 or 4 stages yes, but 5 seems a step too far.

My company - large corporate payments firm - does 3 rounds for interns/grads. 1000s of applicants, but we have a very high pass mark for the initial online coding/aptitude tests which filters out 80-85%.

In terms of grad job offers post successful intern year, DS has commented that a lot of the mid level firms he's looked into also promote this.

Once students get and accept a placement do they not apply for any more or carry on applying to see if they can get a 'better' one?
Ds's uni have told hom that it would be bad form to accept one and then switch later But I wondered if all unis discourage this.

@cyclingmum67 My indirect experience is via my DC applying for L7 school leaver accountancy apprenticeships. They went through essentially the same five stage process across a range of Big 4 and mid tier firms at 16 for Y12 summer programmes and/or at 17 for fully fledged roles; they also compared recruitment experiences with parallel grads and now onboard and manage grad entrants.

Your firm sounds like it can sensibly throttle the numbers with a very quantifiable skills-based filter. It could be argued a lot of private practice accountancy is about judgement calls and team dynamics which are skills that can be hard to pin down and correctly identify in the heat of recruitment, so multiple stages do at least allow a cumulative picture to be built up.

My DC did benefit from fast track offers arising from prior summer programmes (the school leaver equivalent of placements) though actually took up other offers as they felt the team and culture were better fits. It is all very time consuming, I admit, and can have a whiff of the Hunger Games about it at times.

Your son has done very well to get to the penultimate stage; the odds now get appreciably better; best of luck to him. My DC can, in retrospect, see that the grind of the recruitment process meant they could be confident the role, team fit and challenges ahead were right for them.

Thanks for the detailed response/insights @PerpetualOptimist

Hunger Games is a very apt description for some of these processes

And I thought the UCAS process was painful lol

Hunger Games analogy is perfect @PerpetualOptimist also thanks for the Uni of York info. Turns out DD2 has been accessing the help they offer, which is great as I wouldn’t have a clue regarding recruitment. DD1 has given her some pointers but she’s never had a F2F interview as it was Covid and a ‘hunger games’ process for her L7 apprenticeship.

@cyclingmum67 Good luck to your DS with the 4th stage. He's done very well.

It does sound like the big corporates are doing 5 stages according to my DS who also went through this. It's rather annoying not being able to speak to anyone until the last stage. There was a popular Cosmetics company he requested notification from once they opened up their placement applications. Suddenly he got an email saying they've reviewed his application and he's been rejected. There was no number he could call to say the computer had got it wrong and he hadn't submitted an application (as they weren't even open yet!) a total computer glitch.

The whole process at least prepares them for what happens when they graduate as they go through the same process the graduates do.

@Shimy - if that's L'Oréal, my DS applied to them, hit Submit and was rejected literally 5 minutes later saying he didn't fit their culture - lol

@cyclingmum67 Yes! it was them..what's that all about?

DD is gutted! She’s been offered an assessment centre day at a prestigious company based in London but they only do the one date which clashes with an in person exam at York uni. York have said the exam is compulsory and cannot be changed. Why they’ve scheduled in person exams during the two months when these recruitment assessments take place is beyond me. Such poor planning for a degree that offers a year in industry. The company are only offering the one day; there’s no alternative. She’s so very very frustrated and disappointed. She said today that she’d NEVER recommend doing a placement year as the whole process is incredibly difficult, time consuming and highly likely, futile. She sounded very despondent.

@NotDonna - that's really frustrating, from both the University, but also the company who, you would hope appreciate that a lot of universities have exams in January, and therefore, should have at least 2 assessment days.

Re She said today that she’d NEVER recommend doing a placement year as the whole process is incredibly difficult, time consuming and highly likely, futile - my son is coming round to that view also.

His real bug-bear is the companies who won't give feedback - especially post assessment centre + those small companies who quote "Given the high volume of applications we receive we are unable to provide feedback"

@NotDonna I have taken a bit of flack for saying these courses are over sold. I believe they work for a minority but others have too many problems and it’s too time consuming.

It’s a shame companies cannot do assessments on a day before term starts. I’m gutted did your DD! Hardly rocket science to have an assessment day before term starts and tell applicants in advance. When DD was doing mini pupillages, they were scheduled for holidays because Chambers understood uni terms. However what would dc do if they had 5 assessment days?

They were great for my DC's - they returned to their university for third year with a greater insight and had gained two years maturity in a year. They also had something to put on their CV and references. And knew what they wanted to do (or in one case what not to do).
And it is good practice in doing video interviews and assessment centres before big one of graduate applications

@TizerorFizz Re However what would dc do if they had 5 assessment days?

Unless they clash with a non-missable event like an exam, I'd recommend they attend the assessment.

This was the case 30 years ago when I was at university - you had to miss days to attend interviews for graduate job interviews.

That is frustrating for DD2 @NotDonna. Hopefully she can regroup and press on.

Whilst London & Home Counties domiciled students have the potential advantage of free accommodation if applying for London-centric sectors like financial services, they also are up against lots of other students in the same boat.

Entry level management schemes are relatively rare and I can well imagine that London-based L'Oreal and others attract huge interest. However, many of entry level management schemes that do exist are in the food processing sector and, by their nature, are more geographically dispersed; these can provide opportunities to gain frontline experience and genuine responsibility.

Some such schemes are currently recruiting (eg Nestle, I think) and others are opening in the new year (eg Greencore). These can mean relocating and/or leveraging university location but that also can also reduce relative competition, so thinking laterally and strategically can help.

@fiftiesmum No doubt if you can actually get one. My DDs could do all of that without a year in industry. They did holiday work and had good cvs. There’s other things a year can be used for, eg acquiring further qualifications or earning money earlier.

My DC's got the extra qualification from the year in industry - something like diploma in industrial studies and were paid for the year. One was called for interview on the grad scheme bypassing the multiple layers of pretests. There are certain sectors where it is much easier to get placements and it seems to get harder each year to get somewhere.

@TizerorFizz Re they did holiday work and had good cvs - unfortunately, they no longer seem to be enough when applying to placements/graduate roles (the two processes are now indistinguishable) for mid/large firms with openings.

My DS had part time retail/kitchen roles through school and has a good CV (politics society chairman and rugby captain, Dean's commendation) - however, these don't become relevant to the hiring process unless you're able to pass the various online aptitude tests/AI video interviews/case studies/psychometric tests/coding tests etc. that companies are embracing for their initial recruitment steps.

Small firms are an option, but very few seem to be hiring currently.

My DDs tailored their cvs to their intended careers. So sport wasn’t necessary. Nor a job in a kitchen at school. DD1 didn’t do remote assessments because she’s a barrister. However her cv was built around wanting that career in a particular field of law. So kitchen work would be irrelevant. She was asked about her work and volunteering at interviews though. She too had organised things at uni - eg ball chair and president of a society but holiday work and voluneeering meant more.

Only large firms do remote recruiting because they are inundated. Lots of mid sized firms recruit without all of that. Many don’t offer placement years so of course take grads so personality and ability matter but not necessarily practice at assessments. In my view students are myopic. They don’t look at the world outside larger companies they have heard of. They might actually do better looking at mid sized ones.

I was really talking about doing a MEng instead of a BEng. Doing accountancy qualifications after 3 years at uni, not 4. Both routes give higher wages sooner. It’s therefore a trade off but I’d always recommend (for example) a 4 year MEng and not the 4 year BEng with a year in industry for career progression and a more ambitious person.

Of course grads with no placements get jobs but they do apply for summer internships. These are often better. Certainly useful for the majority of students where degrees don’t have placements. Of course non placement degrees are often at the elite unis.

I agree with @PerpetualOptimist - the well known companies will be inundated, my DS applied for quite a few of those and got through to a couple of assessment centres, but was rejected afterwards. He then started to look at less well known companies that might not be quite as competitive. The placement he's secured isn't a household name (well, not known to me before he applied) but it will be fabulous experience. Its just outside of a large city though - I imagine not being in London / Manchester / Birmingham etc was also less attractive for some.

I think it will be hugely valuable for him (not just from to an employer, but for him personally in giving him an insight to see exactly what he's interested in / specific areas he wants to pursue) - his placement is actually 13 months, seeing different parts of an organisation, getting his "business" head on. Its a million miles away from holiday jobs / part time work experience. Definitely for the types of grad roles he'll be going for, it will be an advantage.

@NotDonna my DS has done a couple of assessment centres and where its been a single day, it has been made clear on the application advertisement - so says something along the lines of "if successful you will be invited to an assessment day on XX January 2025" so you have as much notice as possible. Appreciate not all do that but its something to look for so you don't waste your time. Its unfortunate that it clashes with an exam - my DS has missed lectures and had to catch up afterwards.

My DDs tailored their cvs to their intended careers. So sport wasn’t necessary. Nor a job in a kitchen at school. DD1 didn’t do remote assessments because she’s a barrister. However her cv was built around wanting that career in a particular field of law. So kitchen work would be irrelevant. She was asked about her work and volunteering at interviews though.

She was asked about work and volunteering at interviews - so her work and other experiences were of interest to them. As an employer, whilst I agree you should tailor your CVs according to the role you're applying for, I'd suggest it's risky to leave out even unrelated work experience. In some cases, it might make the difference between getting an interview or not.

@OMGitsnotgood Yes. But work in the holidays. Targeted work and volunteering. Not a whole year out of uni doing it. She’s a barrister. Chambers would not want to know about kitchen work. It’s irrelevant at age 16. Work and volunteering before applying for pupilage is what mattered. It had to be relevant. For less competitive business roles pre uni jobs could indicate a grafter. However it doesn’t say much about whether you will be a decent barrister. In DHs company it would not tell you if they would be a decent engineer either. A MEng would be superior plus some evidence of recent relevant work but not a year’s worth. If they only wanted to recruit at BEng level, then work might be useful but that would not necessarily trump a MEng. For progression in the company it definitely would not.

Having 5 assessments days would be a nice problem to have!