Intern Oyinda talks about her eight-week placement

I'm coming to the end of my internship with RWE npower now and what a brilliant eight weeks it’s been!

How I became an intern at npower

I came across the internship opportunity via their Future Leaders competition – I saw the amazing prize was a trip to the Amazon Rainforest, which has been a lifelong dream of mine. When I looked into it further, I found that in addition to the Amazon trip, the winners would also be offered an internship with npower, which was really the cherry on the cake! The competition was open to universities across the UK, encouraging teams to enter with different ideas to inspire people in their community to live more sustainably. My team, Go Topless, focussed on ways to reduce, reuse and recycle promotional t-shirts given out to students. We were one of the winning teams. I was thrilled to win, not just because I was going to travel to the Amazon (which is only a few weeks away now!) but also, during the course of the competition, I’d come to know people working at npower and realised how great it would be to work with them in the future. I actively asked to join the graduate recruitment team, working with the people who’d mentored me during the competition.

First impressions

I wasn't really sure what to expect before I started as I’d only worked in a very informal, start-up business before –I thought it would probably be very corporate. On my first day,I felt instantly at home and after day two felt like I’d been there forever. Whilst it is undeniably a corporate business, the people are so lovely and welcoming, so it didn't feel intimidating at all.

My role

Working in the team that organises graduate recruitment was fascinating. As a student who is going to graduate soon, seeing how graduate schemes work from the ‘other side’ has proved to be very useful. Since being in the team, I’ve done a lot of one-off bits of work and long term projects: I helped to hire new interns, worked on the social media strategy and arranged an intern event for 20 people. Working on the social media strategy side was particularly interesting, as I fit the target audience for the social media pages (being a student) so could offer some real insight. I also organised a focus group to better understand what should be done to improve npower’s social media offering.

Why an internship?

For those looking to apply for an internship with npower, I’d say this: go for it! The first point in its favour is that it’s a paid internship, which isn't the case everywhere. It’s also very flexible – you can ask to go into specific areas and, if there’s a particular aspect you’re interested in, everyone is very happy to help and introduce you to the relevant people in the business. You can learn more about the internship opportunities on offer here.

What I've learnt I've learnt

a lot about the value of graduates in npower. They have a lot of time and money invested in them but this investment is carefully calculated to pay off – there’s a definite return on investment. It’s also been a great chance for me to improve my organisational and task management skills. In addition, I've been exposed to a lot of marketing strategy, an area which I was already interested in and might well look into further in the future. The chance to network with and learn from a number of different senior team members at npower has also proved invaluable and I hope it will stand me in good stead in the future.

My Future?

After my trip to the Amazon, I'm planning on going travelling for a year so I've got a while before I have to make any long term choices but I know that this internship will have a real influence on the course of my career in the future.

Are you interested in a career with RWE npower? Click here to apply for vacancies.