Joshua Lyman – Work Experience Placement 2023 – Documentation of Experience

Hello, my name is Josh and I am a 15 year old GCSE student. I am here at Orbits IT to get a feel for the real working world and progress my knowledge of business and computer technology. I have been granted this opportunity by the Earls High School in order to give me an idea of the world of work.

Introduction:

I chose Orbits as my work experience placement because I have always had a developed interest in computers and technology. The idea of the internet and the technological side of computing is fascinating to me and it is the main reason I have been influenced to choose the work experience placement I have. I hope that the Orbits team can help progress my knowledge of the industry and propel my knowledge, skills, and interest to higher levels. I have always learnt better from a practical approach and have the confidence to apply myself into an environment with the practicality I want. Being in an environment in the industry I am looking to explore allows me to get an idea of what area of computing i want to be a part of and that i enjoy the most, coming to work at Orbits gives me a wide range of opportunities to find out which areas are most enjoyable and intriguing for me, I will use this to create my career path in IT.

My Future in Employment:

IT is the industry in which I aim to be a part of when I leave education. Working in an environment for cybersecurity and technical care can be extremely beneficial to my skill set in a wide range of areas for my future employment. For example I can acquire a wider idea of customer service and 1st/2nd line support for IT. I will have better communication and teams skills from this wider understanding and can be a valuable asset to a workforce. I want to endeavor into a future career in IT because the industry is increasing at a massive rate inside its sector and I want to have a part in it, at the Earls I take computer science in order to increase my understanding of the ins and outs of computers, for example how they work and how I can apply the taught skills to a future employment.

Previously Acquired Skills:

From a primary school age in year 5 I have always had an overall interest in the IT world and its applications to life. I am an avid gamer so I have a wide understanding of using IT in multiple formats. in my last year of primary school I became a IT monitor for my schools to take on added responsibility and widen my skillset range. I cared for the IT department ensuring all laptops and other hardware were in proper working condition. Doing this gave me a big responsibility to allow all computing lessons in the school were available to take place. Another aspect of this responsibility is that I was given the opportunity to go into computer lessons and carry out lessons and/or support the teachers in lessons.

In addition to my leadership and responsibility roles in school, I am also consistently learning new skills via my computing course in GCSE, this is allowing my wider knowledge to grow.

Work Experience Week:

First Day of Work (17/07/23):

In my first day of work experience for Orbits IT I began with a warm welcome from the team here and began my tour around the office, Jim went over the rules and expectations of the workplace to ensure I knew what I was expected to do and to give me an introduction to the contents of the work i will be doing here during my placement, this included the health and safety and fire safety for the building. as we did the tour I was introduced to the team and get set up with my accounts at my desk along with Harrison, Mya, Alex, and Jordan. Once I had been prepped/introduced into the workplace I began writing up my blog post in preparation for the day to get a head start on my tasks here at Orbits IT. My tasks consisted of completing my allocated course on cybersecurity in PII and beginning on my microtasks inside the website. These tests and informative videos gave me and instant boost of knowledge on the subject with me learning about encryption and the dos and don’t of security such as: keeping passwords varied across platforms, not having my passwords easily accessible or easy to decode, and keeping a strong defense against hackers in the form of firewalls.

Upon completion of this course I was allowed my allocated half an hour lunch break and got to know the other employees here at Orbits. Once I was done with my lunch I was paired up with Harrison for a tour around the systems and details of the company, I was shown the servers and internet layout of the building giving me a deeper look into hardware. Harrison was informative and very patient with my tour and gave me the confidence to answer questions and make a few mistakes along the way to learn better on the subjects covered over the couple hours we spent together. During my tour we went through multiple systems such as CIPP and HALO, I learnt the way these systems operate and their functions inside the business, this gave me a better insight to the day-to-day uses the employees apply them to. Harrison also took a couple enquiries in my presence to give me a sense for the customer service aspect of his job as a first-line worker, I was shown the way their caller systems work and how they carry out tickets made by customers.

Additionally I had a catch up meeting with Jim in order for him to find out how I was getting on, he gave me a more in depth chat on the expectations of the business and allocated me a task to carry out using a Raspberry PI to find out about the applications it can have to a business and come up with and idea/design to use on one to be applied into the business, this interests me a lot as it is a new piece of hardware for me to learn about and can possibly help me in future problems having the subject specific knowledge I need for solving problems involving this hardware. I have thoroughly enjoyed my first day here at Orbits IT, every task I have been a part of today has been personally very intriguing and because of me extreme interest in the subjects at hand I have been able to keep focused and really progress my knowledge thanks to the people here. The most interesting aspect to me was learning about the companies protocols and how they handle enquiries from customers as it is a new area of the job I have not experienced before. I believe working in this atmosphere and job could become frustrating as it is the same thing each day. However the work environment and wide range of customer queries I could be presented with each day gives a refreshing feel to the workplace. I look forward to Day 2!

Second Day at Work (18//07/23):

Upon arrival of my second day here at Orbits I found myself drastically more settled and easy about being here in a work environment, I greeted the staff and sat myself at my desk in order to get logged in and ready for my day. To wake up and begin the day I went onto PII protect to take on some more of the micro-quizzes set up for me. Jim came to me not long after and proposed a task to me to sort out the workshop as the disposal team for the tech waste was coming soon and the old laptops, servers, computers, and input components needed. My first allocated task was to open up all the PC’s, this was my first time doing any real hardware work and Jim was very patient and helpful in teaching me the look of each component. Because of this I am now able to identify a hard drive and know how to remove it successfully from a computer base. Once the hard drives were all removed from the base units to be wiped, I began making the working area more tidy in order for employees to maneuver the area easier. the computers are now all out of the way and ready to be disposed of.

My next task was to open up the old and broken laptops in the workshop to remove the hard drives from these as well. Jim demonstrated on the first laptop so I knew how and what to do when dismantling a laptop because if they were not broken I would want to be careful and correctly dismantle the laptops to send back to a customer in one piece. There were significantly more screw in the laptops than the PC’s which made finding no hard drive in the laptop even more irritating. However the idea of more responsibility and expectations was a big motivator in completing my tasks. Finishing off the laptops was the end of my allocated tasks in the workshop for the day and I headed back to the desk to carry on with PII Protect and catch up with the staff about their morning so far.

Shortly after I progressed along PII I took my lunch break and prepped for my next task of the day. At the end of my lunch break Harrison took me over to the workshop for me to begin working on a pair of MACs, the task was to erase any and all data from the MAC and ensure that there were no saves on there in preparation for their disposal this week. I had never worked or even touched a MAC before and neither had Harrison so we both worked together in the process of sorting them out. The first MAC erase went smooth and we were able to work through it with little trouble however with the second fairly older MAC we had more trouble due to its outdated OS and model. After finishing off my task with the MACs I returned back to my desk to continue with the tasks given to me by Jim for the week to keep caught up on my work.

In the late afternoon, i was approached by Alex a desktop support staff at Orbits to begin a job set for him setting up piece of technology for a business, i was shown the software and the hardware which was further explained to me by Alex so I understood how everything worked and why he was doing what he was doing to give me a broader understanding of the tech involved. Alex was very approachable and supportive in getting me to understand what to do correctly and made the experience a lot more calm being very friendly and humorous from start to finish.

I am thoroughly enjoying my time here and getting to know the working world and its workers. All of the staff here at the Orbits midlands office have been very warm and welcoming of me into the team for my induction this week and I look forward to progressing the week learning more and more about cybersecurity and the added responsibility as an employee!

Third Day at Work (19//07/23):

I started my third day off with completing some more of my PII Protect assignment, it has become pretty routine to begin with this to start my day, they are very engaging and I learn a lot from them which is a bonus as I will learn more from the videos and as a result be benefited in my GCSE course with having a larger knowledge than what we have been already taught. Shortly after I was approached by Alex to continue with setting up the hardware for an order so that they are all set up and linked for the client. after shadowing him on one of the setups I proceeded to do the rest of them myself in order to get some hands on experience on the job. This allowed me to take initiative and boosted my enthusiasm as I was able to have an independent impact on the order.

Once I had finished setting up the hardware I moved to the desk in order to check the software was correct and updated – with Alex’s supervision- and that concluded my main task for the morning. I then proceeded with my Raspberry Pi assignment given by Jim. I found a design idea shown to me by Jim that I possibly could do which involves downloading a software called Pi-hole. it is an add blocker that can work with mobile, laptops, PCs etc. I will begin the process of putting it together sometime during the rest of my week, I am excited to do this because it is a new piece of equipment I had never seen of used before: Having the new skill with the Pi will be a good addition to my skillset as I gives me another problem solving solution. As I had hoped in applying for this work placement position, I have developed exponentially larger amounts of subject knowledge in IT, thanks to Jim and his Orbits team I am growing rapidly. They have all together created a nurturing environment in which I have the ability to progress which is exactly what I was hoping to receive from this opportunity.

After my lunch break I began my shadowing session with Harrison in which he and Jordan both showed me how they were transferring and updating the servers in order to back them up. I found this semi-interesting however the loading times of the software used was quite slow so it gave me a fair amount of time to talk to them both and get to know a bit about their roles and opinions on working here at Orbits IT, both of which said it was a great working environment. I also had a quick session with Mya where I learnt a bit about advertisements and how she sets up the backgrounds for clients. Both Mya and Harrison were very descriptive and enthusiastic about what they had to do which made learning and listening about it even more interesting for me.

A great third day here at Orbits! Can’t wait to begin the next.

Fourth Day at Work (20/07/23):

As usual for my time here at Orbits I began by doing more quizzes on PII protect to begin learning more about the SLAM method and also phishing emails and the telltale signs on one being received. I find this quite interesting because as someone who constantly uses computer technology it is very useful to know these things in order to keep myself and others safe when online. Throughout the morning a recording crew came in to interview the staff here including Jim, all of the staff spoke clearly and with a very motivated tone which showed their confidence in themselves.

During the time the crew were filming the office I was shadowing Harrison whilst he sorted some tickets, he walked me through the idea of VPN’s and the way they work for what purpose they serve. I found this interesting but not to the degree that I have other aspects of our shadowing sessions as it is not an area of IT that I find maximally engaging. Harrison did not seem overly excited by the subject we were discussing either but he kept his enthusiasm and was again a very engaging mentor for the couple hours we spent together today. Another shadow session I did with Harrison which was slightly more hands on than the others was setting up a laptop from scratch for a client to be sent off to them. We added all of the essential apps and files for the laptop to function at best it can and linked its data up to the Orbits server so that we have access to the laptop remotely.

After my lunch break I had a fair amount of free time so i got to work on developing and finishing the design and plan I need for my Raspberry Pi project Jim set me. I found all the software code and functions I will need to use in order to migrate all the data I will need for my programs design to work, I wrote up the step by step plan to create and implement Pi-hole onto the Pi. I will begin making and putting together everything tomorrow to have it completed on my last day. To conclude the day Alex asked me to rip up a ton of boxes so they can be disposed of in the bin. This was my final task of the day and was the conclusion to my penultimate day here at Orbit IT. I am disappointed to be near the end of my time here but I have really enjoyed it, I cannot think of one negative to list.

I look forward to my last and final day here!

Fifth Day at Work(21/07/23) :

Its the final day! And I started it by completing the final quizzes on PII protect, – all 80 of them – in doing this I was placed in 3rd place of the employee score. I am proud of this accomplishment because I feel it shows my resilience and determination in challenging tasks – doing the quizzes has allowed me to flourish on these traits. I then finally got onto setting up my raspberry PI with the Pi-hole design I produced yesterday. it was a VERY challenging task and it took me a lot of hard work because I did not know a single thing about Raspberry Pi’s the beginning of this week and I spent the week going from 0% knowledge on the computer hardware to knowing a fair amount about the way it works and being able to create a functional design. In my personal opinion this is completely down to Jim and him pushing me to do more with my skills and to push myself way out of my comfort zone and this is something I really love about Orbits, the whole team has a growth mindset and being around like-minded people has made me persevere in my struggles this week.

After completing my project I sat down with Harrison for our final shadowing session together and we went more through creating the backup servers and completing tickets put forth by clients to give me a broader knowledge of fixing IT problems. For lunch Jim very kindly provided us with a takeaway, this made everyone in the team very energized and happy, I saw this as a very good act of leadership by Jim and admire his caring work/management ethic.

Its been an amazing week and I have genuinely enjoyed every single second I have spent here this week, from the people to the atmosphere to the work ethic of the business itself. Everything has been top level for me. I was at first quite anxious to be in a work environment with a whole new group of people, but as soon as I was acquainted and introduced to the team I was instantly settled and I felt like I could fit into the working environment with ease. Shadowing everyone here has been a massive eye opener and confidence boost for me in admitting my weaknesses and learning in order to reinforce my strengths, every positive of me has been boosted and every negative has been lessened – thanks to all the crew here’s efforts and patience with me. I could not be more grateful to Jim and Orbits IT for the opportunity and mental boost that it has given me and it will be an experience that stays with me for life.

I have loved my time here and I think the only thing I can say to describe the Orbits IT team is “They are an amazing and empowering group of people and they each elevate each other under the empowered management of Jim and his co-workers”.

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