Considering taking a placement year to boost your skills and gain invaluable work experience? Read this article and find out how to best prepare and what to expect from a placement from Bobo’s point of view. Bobo is one of our students, who completed a placement year in a community pharmacy.

Getting involved while on placement

It may be difficult to settle in when you first start on placement, getting to know a completely new workplace, getting to know new colleagues, and taking on your designated role for the first time. Fresh from university with no or little relevant experience can be difficult.

But there is absolutely nothing to lose! You get to learn on the go and get to know your colleagues better day by day. Remember that there is nothing to lose, as you are here to learn. There is no harm in going the extra mile by asking an extra question, by attending social events or even casual dinners after work. When I undertook my placement, I was afraid to take the first step. Eventually, I got to know my colleagues better, developed practical experience, gained new knowledge almost every day, and attended dinners they invited me to. There is absolutely nothing to be afraid of no matter how difficult the first step might seem. A placement year is intended to build you into a stronger person with critical thinking, as well as build up knowledge in your academic studies and career.

What to expect during your first week on placement

Your first week on placement might feel a little daunting. There is a lot to get used to, and it will take some time to familiarise yourself with everything on placement.

Top tip would be to get a notebook and write everything down. Personally, when I took on my placement year, I was taught how to operate different systems on the computer, using the dispensing machine as I spent my year in the pharmacy, and on top of that I had to learn about different medications. I would then find some scrap paper available somewhere and write down everything that I was taught so that I would not forget. A great way to remember things and to reflect on the processes being taught to see whether I truly understand or not. Once you survive through your first week of placement, there is nothing really to worry about in the future weeks. You will begin to remember a lot of the processes and eventually do a great job.

Another tip is to engage with your colleagues in your first week. Get to know their names, get to know their role, so you know who to look for help in the relevant area, as this would be an important marker while you are working together in the future.

Making the most of your placement opportunity

Be really engaged with your colleagues. Get to know them better and find out of interest why they are currently here doing their designated role, and how long they have been in the relevant field. You may find a lot of colleagues come from diverse backgrounds. For example, I got to know a pharmacist who used to work at Boots, and she would tell me the difference between her previous role and her current role as a pharmacist in a community pharmacy.

Be proactive and always ready to learn. Nothing harmful with learning an extra skill and knowing an extra fact. The more you learn, the more you know! This is what a placement year is intended to look like and this is the entire point of undertaking a placement year. There may or may not be another chance where you get an opportunity to take on a placement year in between your second and third year of university. Experiences need to be gained before graduating, and a placement year might be best place to do so, compared to work experience that usually lasts for a few weeks.

What to expect during a placement

Expect that things may not go as well as you expected when you first started. Trust the person you are before starting a year-long placement, compared to when you finish the entire year, will be two different people. The development in yourself would like be huge and you’d have built yourself as a stronger person for the future.

Expect the unexpected. If you are working with patients in the healthcare system for example, similarly to what I have completed, I was facing patients every day and somehow built a bond with some of them. What that I did not expect was that I would be facing certain patients’ passing. Therefore, be ready if you will or want to work in a role in contact with patients almost every day.

Expect to be overwhelmed with all sorts of knowledge. Always be ready to take on another fact and another skill. There will be so much to learn if you are a keen learner like myself, and a placement year would be the best way of adapting your knowledge learnt from your studies and applying that into real-life situations.

Finally, expect the fun!

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Big thanks to Bobo Chiew, a final year Pharmacology & Physiology Student at the University of Westminster.

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