Finding (and Getting !) Your Industrial Placement

Many engineering undergraduate courses appear to offer an industrial placement, possibly the third year of your degree during which you have the opportunity of working for an organisation offering a role aligned with your course. 

If this is available, I would strongly encourage you to take up this opportunity. 

From my personal experience, 

• it puts into perspective the academic theory of your course, 
• enables you to see how the real world works, 
• observe and engage in the many activities required to run a business, 
• helps to confirm whether your initial chosen career path is really the one for you or find out what you would really like to do, and 
• enables you to build up your CV - and 
• possibly provide an income for the year.

How do I get a placement ?

Well, it isn't going to just fall into your lap ! - you need to plan, prepare, and actively work towards getting that placement - you will have competition for the places on offer. 

Firstly, speak to your academic organisation -   your tutor, the placement advisor, the faculty office for example - whoever is there to advise you, and follow that advice.

After that, I can think of 3 simple steps towards helping achieve your industrial placement goal:

1. What type of role would you like ?

You need to work out what role you would like for the year, perhaps that is easy - your goal is to be a web developer, embedded software engineer, robotic application engineer, or business/games/mobile apps developer - a quite specific job.

However, if you are on a general engineering course, perhaps a computer science course - then decide what interests you - Which modules do you find the most enjoyable ? What type of applications do you develop as a hobby, just for fun in your own time ? 

Once you know what role you would ideally like, then ...

2. Find organisations which offer such a role

This may not be obvious, they might not have 'industrial placement' on the careers page of their website, but do your research. Look for companies that operate in the sector which interests you - the game developers, or manufacturing, or defence companies. Think about the location as well, perhaps you would like to live back at home, or in your term time location, or anywhere in the country ? 

Anyway, you need to identify possible placement companies. Again, your academic organisation will be able to help provide suggestions, perhaps businesses with which they have a good relationship, and have offered placements to students in the past.

3. Make yourself stand out

Why should that organisation hire you for the year ? Think about this from the employer's perspective, they will have to invest time and money in you - allocate an engineer or manager as a mentor to look after you and supervise your activities, provide you with office space and equipment, and pay you a salary. 

This is a big investment from an employer, because all organisations are busy, and it is very unlikely they would be able to give you a standalone project which you could complete without any previous training, supervision, or knowledge about their products and how they develop software.

Your cover letter/email and CV must stand-out from all other applicants - what makes you particularly attractive to the organisation you are approaching ? Perhaps you have a hobby or pet project you have worked on in your own time - something which interests you, but would also be of interest to a perspective employer.

If you have developed websites either for yourself for fun, or perhaps for a family member who has their own business, or your local charity shop - then these would be of interest to a professional web development company. 

Otherwise,  if you are approaching a manufacturing or robotics company - then have you played around with Raspberry Pi and Arduino boards - ok, not just played, but actually completed a project which you can talk about and demonstrate - perhaps a short video of your mobile robot navigating a maze ? 

If you don't already have this, then don't panic - there is still time - but get working now. Use some of that spare time wisely, invest it in your pet project - something which interests you, and aligns with the business of a prospective future employer. If this is also an academic assignment then great - you are working towards multiple goals with the same project.

Create your cover letter/email and CV, and run it past your tutor or supervisor for advice, then contact your target organisations - just jump in, you've got nothing to lose !

I hope my comments are of use to you, and best of luck in your endeavours !