After leaving development with all their systems intact it was time for me to move on to marketing. This was the part of my secondment I’d been looking forward to most as it’s what my degree was in. I wasn’t exactly sure about what I would get to do, but it turns out they were happy to let me help with just about anything.
One of the tasks I got to do while I was there was create some web pages on justice as it’s an area of interest to us and our customers just now. This was really interesting because it meant that I got to do some research on different justice systems and how they work. The worrying part came when I was told I would be doing something I’m scared of… Continue reading…
Having built my model and finished my secondment in Services, I then moved to Marketing where my new role involved promoting my model, getting everything ready for the MASHnet conference and producing a mailer that would be sent to a couple of hundred UK manufacturers. No pressure then! Having studied some marketing courses at university (and not really being a huge fan), I wasn’t convinced I would really enjoy my time in marketing, but one thing I’ve learned since leaving uni is studying a subject is very different to actually putting it into practise – as I soon discovered during this secondment. I learned so much more by working alongside Jill and Steven (our top class marketers) than I did the entire time at uni, and I also realised that marketing isn’t so bad after all. Continue reading…
So I said I’d share what I’d done during my secondments to the different departments, so here goes… One of the departments I got to spend some time in was development. This is the one I was most apprehensive about because, before starting at SIMUL8 Corporation, I left anything technical that needed done to my friends or brother! When I realised I was going to a department where writing computer software is their main task I was sure I would break something, however, straightaway I was reassured that there is more to development than writing code.
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Well, where do I start!? So much has been going on since my last post… We’ve moved office to a gorgeous converted church as we were fast outgrowing our old place! We had a great moving in party and quiz (thanks to Suzy and Cat), I’ve moved back to the Development team and… It’s nearly Christmas – Yay!
But back to the SIMUL8 stuff…My first Development assignment was to look back over my secondments in Sales, Services and Marketing and identify a project that I could tackle that would help one (or all!) of the teams. Continue reading…
So my time in the services team is now over and I have my very own simulation model to show for it. My project involved building a simulation of Trauma and Orthopaedics operating theatres which was really interesting – although I have to say I’m glad to see the back of having to spell and say the word anaesthetist! There was, however, added pressure in knowing that my model was going to be shown at MASHnet (Modelling and Simulation in Healthcare Network) annual conference. So, not only was it my first attempt at building a real model, but I had to make sure it was perfect.
I wasn’t however left on my own, instead the consultants (who aren’t so scary after all) were really helpful and guided me through the main steps required to build a simulation, and despite the fact that I am relatively new to simulation, I managed to finish and perfect my model in time for MASHnet. Job done!
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When I got told that I could use Wizzy Wig to type my blog I was sold! Turns out it’s WYSIWYG (which suddenly sounded less magical and more technical/scary) actually just means what you see is what you get… and even me who like Suzy is new to blog writing can cope with that!
Firstly a bit about me – I’m Laura, I graduated from Strathclyde in July with a BA in Accounts & Marketing and then a few days later started my job at the European office of SIMUL8 Corporation. I’ve been here 4 months now and the time has flown by. I joined the sales team, but since starting I’ve worked in every department of the company, moved into a shiny new office, enjoyed a couple of company afternoons out and thats just for starters!
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As one of the recent graduate hires, I’ve been asked to take part in this blog writing stuff. My experience of blogs pretty much amounts to zero but how hard can it be…? So this is my first post (and I guess possibly my last depending on how this one goes).
A wee introduction to begin with, I’m Suzy and I joined the ever expanding sales team in the middle of August. I graduated from Strathclyde in July with my BA in International Business and Modern Languages, which involved spending a year in Barcelona, (and has led to a complete obsession with the place).
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My last secondment of the graduate training program was with our Marketing team. It was really interesting but fun at the same time! I designed some of the collateral for a breakfast meeting we held with the Scottish Government – who knew that choosing pictures for brochures was so tough? I also got a chance to take a look at Google Analytics and some of the statistics for our websites – I’ll be taking a look later to see how popular this blog post is!
My main task was to design a model for YouSIMUL8: the world’s first simulation sharing website that we created recently. We chose a hot topic from the press – the launch of the Barclays Bikes scheme in London – and created a model of a similar proposed scheme in Edinburgh, Scotland. Thankfully I was able to put my new simulation building skills that I acquired during my Services team secondment to good use!
You can try out the model at: http://yousimul8.com/watch.php?x=4c6cea1a4cc22
Although I have to admit the most fun thing I did was design t-shirts for our SIMUL8 mascot dogs, Roxy and Duke – all in a good day’s work!
My latest secondment was to our Services Team where I spent a month recreating a project that one of our consultants completed for a large American firm. I have to admit that at first I was really scared – I thought there was no way I would be able to simulate such a complex process!
The process involved modeling the flow of customers through a vehicle licensing facility to identify how best to train and allocate staff to reduce customer waiting times and staff overtime. In the current setup, bottlenecks were forming and, on occasions, customers were left waiting for hours with staff having to stay behind after their shift ended to deal with the build up of customers. One of the consultants acted as my client and we had various meetings throughout the project. Continue reading…
I am currently a bit behind with my blog (in terms of the things that have been going on). I actually went to the OR52 conference on 8th September. The week before the conference I realised that I was likely to be networking during the conference. I think it looks much more professional to have a business card at hand when you talk to people, so I put the wheels in motion to acquire some. What I hadn’t anticipated was that just deciding on the contents on the business card would turn into a proper consulting job.
The first difficulty was that we are moving office (as I wrote during a previous entry). This means that the business cards that we order now will not be useful in a month’s time. The other thing is that we might be having a new fax number and finally we had to decide on my job title. And I figured ordering business cards was just a matter of sending an email to our business services manager. Well, we decided that it would be best to include our new address on the business card, although this might mean that people try to contact us at the new address, while we are still located at the old one, not to include a fax number on the business card (everyone uses email anyway) and my official job title now is consultant.
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