Kerrie Warburton

FV-Grad-KW Hi folks, and welcome to my first graduate blog post! I'll just tell you a bit about myself to begin with.

I did an undergraduate degree in Biology at Durham and then went on to do an MSc in Sustainability at the University of Leeds. After my Masters I spent two years working as an environmental consultant within the waste industry, helping local authorities to improve their recycling collections and working on a wide variety of research projects. However, I found myself wanting a role that would challenge me more, provide me with better training and development opportunities and really give me the chance to progress quickly - and that is when I came across the Yorkshire Water Graduate Scheme!

The application process did seem quite daunting at first but it's all there for a reason - not only to make sure that you are right for Yorkshire Water, but also to make sure that YW is right for you! After the final assessment centre my soon-to-be sponsoring manager called me really quickly to tell me the good news, and pretty soon afterwards I was assigned a "buddy" (a current graduate) who I could attack with all my questions over the summer.

When September came round we enjoyed a two week induction, the first week staying together with all the other graduates in a hotel so we could really get to know each other. Spending two weeks learning about all the different business units, company values, processes, all about the graduate scheme and development opportunities, meeting the directors, and, to be honest, eating a HUGE amount of food together really helped us all settle in quickly and feel a part of the company.

I am a couple of weeks into my first placement now, and I have started off in leakage where everyone is working to reduce the volume of leaks across the network by quite a substantial amount, whilst the very real possibility of another super cold winter and pipes bursting all over the place creeps ever closer! This first placement has been designed to help me learn loads about the company, meet lots of people and see how this team fits in with the rest of the business. It's always scary starting something totally new but everyone's been really friendly and helpful so I'm enjoying getting stuck in and have the feeling that I'm going to learn an awful lot very quickly!

Kerrie

May 2012

Hi again,

Another blog post, another placement! I really enjoyed my time in Customer Experience - so much so that I didn't want to leave! In the end I spent the majority of my time on a couple of big customer facing projects. One was working with teams all across my business unit to review the standard letters going out of the business (there are about 250 in total - many due for an upgrade…) and the second was working on a new process for how we escalate complaints when a customer is demanding to speak to a director.

I've now moved placements again and am working on a project that's all to do with internal sewage flooding - yes that's right - sewage entering somebody's house. The project that I'm working on is aiming to improve how we deal with this - one example is working with our service partners to ensure a more thorough investigation the first time we go out to the customer's house. We have a list of about 70 interventions that we're going to try out so I'm definitely learning some good project management skills during this placement!

The WaterAid hike and ceilidh is next month so I'm starting to get excited about that, and I've also been working on a business proposal to introduce official student placements across the business and have a big presentation this week - so fingers crossed that goes well and we get some support from senior management!

Kerrie

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January 2012

Hi folks

So, I've now finished my first placement in leakage. The mild weather meant that there were no crises to respond to, so I mainly worked on the strategic side of things, and developed a number of ideas for improving efficiencies across the teams. As part of this, I had the opportunity to go out with lots of the field teams - looking for leaks, resolving water pressure issues, fitting new meters?there was lots to see and lots to learn! As a Graduate, I've also had the opportunity to get involved with a number of development opportunities; one highlight for me was going to a high school and giving mock interviews and feedback to Year 11 students as part of their GCSE coursework.

I've moved on to my second placement now which is in Customer Experience. I've just started working with a team of case managers who take on all sorts of problems that customers might have and make sure that these get resolved as quickly as possible whilst ensuring that we provide a really high level of customer service. Speaking to all sorts of different customers with all sorts of different queries will be a new challenge for me but the team is really supportive so I'm sure it will go well! During this placement I'm also hoping to spend time with the customer correspondence team and the area case managers - they get out and about across Yorkshire managing the really complex issues, so I'm really looking forward to that!

Other than my "day job", I'm also helping to organise a hike and a ceilidh in the Lake District to raise money for WaterAid, and we've just started organising the induction week for the next intake of grads. I'll let you know how it all goes in my next blog post!

Kerrie

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