Are you a smart, enthusiastic computer science student and developer, who’s looking to work in a fast paced creative digital agency on a wide range of digital projects from eComm to games, apps to business-critical digital applications?
Yes? Then this is a great opportunity to join Enigma’s award winning team during a paid 12 month placement starting in summer 2023.
Headquartered on Newcastle’s quayside, Enigma are a 36 strong team of creative developers, inspiring designers and digital innovators. We work with some of the most ambitious clients from around the UK and design and build market leading web, mobile and bespoke digital applications for them.
Being a developer at Enigma isn’t just about being a great coder, it’s about collaborative problem solving, learning new techniques and skills and pushing the boundaries of technology. At Enigma, you’re not the ‘geek in the corner’, you’re at the centre of everything we do.
We interviewed James Huish about their time on placement last year with General Electric Healthcare and the struggles with online application processes. Here is what they had to say:
Who did your industrial placement with?
General Electric Healthcare
As described on its website, General Electric Healthcare is a leading global medical technology, pharmaceutical diagnostics, and digital solutions innovator. They enable clinicians to make faster, more informed decisions through intelligent devices, data analytics, applications and services, supported by its Edison intelligence platform.
What was your role?
Software engineer in the Medical Imaging Team
Why did you do a placement?
I wanted experience working with programming in an actual job, both to learn and to help with getting a job after graduating
When did you start applying and how many places did you apply for?
I applied for 3 or 4 and had a few video interviews but got rejected, I had more or less given up but then a lecturer posted an advertisement on Canvas, and I applied through them.
How was the application experience?
The applications for most were frustrating with 1-way video interviews where I had to record myself and got no feedback. In the placement I got, I just had one video interview, but it was actually with the people working there, rather than the other 1-way recorded interviews.
What, if any, help did you get from the university when applying?
None, although the placement I got was advertised through a post on Canvas.
What work did you do over the course of your placement year?
It took a long time to get much work but when I did it was a variety of things, for example, porting an application from windows to Linux and adding features, helping to bug fix and improve an application in development, and managing a Blinded Image evaluation (not coding related).
How was the overall experience of doing a placement?
Good, there were times I did not have much to do and also, I was not in a software team. The people were great, and I had a great experience but would have learnt a lot more if I were in a team with more software engineers.
Would you like to go back to that company after your final year?
I would, depending on available roles and location.
Returning from a year in industry to complete their final year at Newcastle University, we interviewed Zach Smith about their time with Newcastle Strategic Solutions Limited. This is what they had to say:
Who did you do your industrial placement with?
Newcastle Strategic Solutions Limited
What was your role?
Software QA Tester
Why did you do a placement?
I did a placement in order to gain some concrete work experience in the software development industry, this is so I could hopefully gain an advantage over my competition when applying for jobs upon graduation
When did you start applying and how many places did you apply for?
I started applying around February/March time and applied for at most 20 people
How was the application experience?
Relatively straightforward, mostly just making sure my CV was up to date. I wrote a cover letter for each company I applied for and tweaked my CV in scenarios where different experiences might’ve been more useful
What, if any, help did you get from the university when applying?
The help I received from the university was mostly to do with their careers site, where companies could post placement opportunities. It was a huge help and ultimately lead me to get this placement
What work did you do over the course of your placement year?
I got the opportunity to do a range of things:
Programming automated tests for builds of NSSLs websites which introduced new features.
Testing on live servers of clients to ensure that everything was working as expected before deploying for the public to see and use.
I also had the opportunity to manually test features on the website to ensure that they met the accessibility criteria required.
I was working alongside teammates in a scrum team and would test whatever the developers would work on before giving it the seal of approval.
How was the overall experience of doing a placement?
Fantastic, I was treated really well during my time at NSSL, except for the odd stressful moment, I enjoyed it. One key value that I really appreciated working there was that my input was important and was truly taken into consideration when working on different projects even when it wasn’t about testing. I made a lot of new friends there during the early talent program that they ran too.
My experience here helped dictate what portion of computer science I would like to specialize in for my final year. Thanks to my time testing the accessibility of the website and new software developed, it has made me want to work in accessibility and hopefully work to improve how accessible software is to the general public.
Would you like to go back to that company after your final year?
Based on my experience? Yes.
With my current circumstances? No, I only say this because following graduation I’d prefer to be employed somewhere where I can live with my family whilst working for a while before I go settle in somewhere like Newcastle. To be honest though, if I was offered a high enough wage to cover the expenses of living alone easily then I probably would take something from NSSL.
