I am helping out the Rostering team to make the rostering of shifts for Maintenance and Works Delivery teams more efficient, straightforward, easily changeable, readily available and up to date. Beside this task, I have been assigned on a project with another fellow intern to collaboratively tackle the issues associated with the ageing road fleet of Network Rail, which to put simply, contains too many vehicles, many of which are underused or are in ageing, bad condition. My responsibility is to build a clearer picture about the current size, condition and cost of Network rail’s road fleet and provide recommendations and options about how they could move forward through looking at the available data and using Power BI, and consulting various individuals around the organisation for their different perspectives. I feel like it is important to stay objective and always back up our objectives and conclusions as our project tackles an issue that is highly political and emotive, therefore remaining focused on objectivity will be key.
My main goal is to improve my data analysis and software utilisation skills to be comfortable relying on information in a corporate setting when it comes to decision-making. Besides this, I am hoping that being exposed to a professional environment, I will not only be able to develop my skills but also build my professional connections, becoming involved in a community, and potentially being able to re-enter the public sector in case I wish to do so in the future.
I found it important to ask questions, be inquisitive and also engage in active listening. Everyone at the company has been incredibly kind, supportive and attentive so far which made me want to engage more as well. I feel like I can approach people and that everyone’s views are sought out. Regular check-ins with my line manager make me feel supported and I feel like the organisation has a keen interest in my development, however, I tried to go the extra mile to make sure that I am seeking out challenges and engaging more and building my relationships at work as well.
So far I have met managers from my team and other teams, divisions, as well as other interns. These interactions have meant that I sometimes had to come out of my comfort zone to embrace challenges to engage in continuous learning and development. I can consciously remind myself to use my strengths like seeking out everyone’s viewpoints, but also to try to avoid my weaknesses that would hinder me through my internship like getting too emotional about decisions or misunderstandings.
I believe that during the past few weeks I have confidently utilised my data analysis skills to extract insights from the massive amounts of raw data that tackles the issue highlighted by my project. This challenge drives me to focus on creating a high quality report and presentation that addresses the issue tackled by my project in a multidisciplinary approach.
My project aims to utilise the rich and diverse data available, which when analysed can yield invaluable insights and information on how the fleet can be reduced in the best way possible to rationalise usage and the number of vehicles. Whilst data discrepancy appeared as a serious challenge, keeping to our aims and focusing on delivering high level insights to decision-makers helped to alleviate this issue.
I believe that I managed to create a deeper, supportive connection with both managers and other fellow interns. The most rewarding thing has been the sense of purpose that this internship experience gave me.
