My placement at TCEG

Bonjour everyone! As a part of my studies at Neoma Business School in Rouen, France, I needed to take a 12 week internship. I decided rather than taking the easy option, I wanted to head to England and found myself an internship at The Creative Engagement Group based in their Manchester offices. In anticipation of my first day - as a French national having lived in France for 18 years - I felt nervous about not being able to understand the notoriously strong Manchester accent, as opposed to worrying about the work I was going to be involved in. But luckily that wasn’t the case!

On my first day I was welcomed with a coffee and tour of the office. Throughout the week, I received inductions from team members working in each department - which meant meeting a lot of people! I was appointed a line manager and it was comforting having check-ins with her to go through my understanding of the business, departments and roles as I was overwhelmed by the amount of information I’d received. Merci beaucoup Sid!

I started my internship at Forty1, the newly launched Employee Engagement brand within The Creative Engagement Group. I was allocated to the team to work specifically on Employee Engagement research which was brilliant! My first project was supporting Beth, Senior Engagement Consultant in gathering workforce insights on one of their pharmaceutical clients. I assisted Beth on client calls where we used smart technology to gather anonymous responses to various key questions and then helped her pulling together and analysing the information we collected into reports.

Whilst supporting on this project, I was evolving my understanding of Employee Engagement and the importance of it within the workplace. I was then asked to spend some time undertaking research on Forty1’s competitors, as well as looking at trends and statistics around effective Employee Engagement - It really struck me then how France is so behind UK and US when it comes to getting your employees engaged.

In addition, I learnt a lot about joint ventures, especially How to successfully do a joint venture and what key elements you need to pay attention to if you want to succeed. The main ingredient to success being trust. During my research, I also realised how many steps are undertaken to launch a product. It made me recognise that I would like to really immerse myself in a product launch one day.

Within my three months, I was also able to support the WRG Logistics team – WRG being a further division of The Creative Engagement Group - with putting together slides for a pitch for a conference and incentive brief. I really enjoyed this as it felt a bit like I was preparing for a holiday, finding imagery and descriptions of destinations, hotels, restaurants and activities.

Halfway through my internship - whilst compiling my thoughts for a university report a few key words kept coming back to me which described my experience so far: interest, diversity, recognition, people, well-being and responsibility.

My internship at The Creative Engagement Group has allowed me to grow personally as my confidence has boosted and I’ve gained new skills in data analysis, reporting and commercial awareness. I also grew a better understanding of the event and communication industry, built my network and have new contacts and references for the future. But most importantly, I now have a clearer view of what it means to be in the professional world, especially in a company that champions an unforgettable experience for the client and a wonderful workplace for the employee.

Through the friendliness of my colleagues, research on Employee Engagement and conversations with my friends in internships elsewhere, I’ve drawn to the conclusion employees are most motivated in a welcoming atmosphere where employees are provided a purpose for their work and where the work is delivered with excellent execution.

A bientot, j’espere!