Supporting a local GCSE student with a week-long work experience at McCanns.
“Going into work experience at McCanns, I was very nervous about making a good impression and people not being as friendly. Everyone at McCanns showed that it wasn’t something to be worried about, but to look forward to.”
Last week, McCann’s welcomed Taylor to our team, a GCSE student from a local school in Nottingham! Taylor joined us for a week of work experience, where he worked for departments across the business and even managed a site visit to our recently awarded Nottingham Pedestrian Footbridge Scheme.
Taylor summarised his work experience at McCanns by saying,
“At McCann, I learnt many different things. I spent at least 2-3 hours in each department over a 1-week period and was welcomed by everyone I spoke to and found that it was a very friendly workspace environment. I often found myself speaking with the people around the office and enjoying myself.”
I spent my first day with Kate Barrett, who gave me some activities to settle into the environment after giving me an induction, introducing me to everyone and showing me around the office.
On the second day, I spent my morning working with purchasing. I got to make my own order catalogue on Excel after I was shown the ropes on how to do it. I then spent the afternoon helping Kate make a PowerPoint of one of our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Toolbox Talks.
On day 3, I was able to go to the Nottingham Pedestrian Footbridge site in the morning. At the site, I learnt about their different methods and plans to move the bridge from where it is being built in Hucknall to the new site. I spent my afternoon working with the environmental department, where I assisted with designing a new policy which merges four policies into one.
Day four was spent with the training department, learning about the qualifications you need to become a trainer. I also learnt about risk assessments and ways to deliver training. In the afternoon, I was with the commercial and pre-construction team. Firstly, with the quantity surveyors, learning and understanding what their job involves. I also spent time with the estimators learning how they price jobs and read drawings. Then I spent time with Marketing, where I was tasked with looking at McCanns website, listing the pros and cons of the website and what I thought about the functionality, design and other aesthetics, as well as doing competitor analysis!
On day 5, I spent my morning with the accounts team, learning how to go through invoices and manage purchases made by McCanns, which was very interesting.
Overall, I would consider my work experience at McCanns a huge learning experience. I had a lot of fun and learnt a lot of things from many friendly people around the office. Thank you for having me at McCanns, and I really appreciate everything you did for me this week.”
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