Uptree

Samira was extremely resilient when applying for apprenticeships, despite receiving rejections she continued to try and improve and found going along to events with Uptree really helpful.

“Going to things like events with Uptree was really really helpful because I got to speak to an apprentice who I am actually friends with today. Taking advantage of any opportunities you have, networking, planning and preparing. One of my favourite sayings that I even say in interviews is that if you fail to prepare then prepare to fail. I think preparation is very important because even if you get rejected I always had this comfort feeling that I did the best I could so that when I came to my interview I prepared a lot.”

She attended FuturesUP which was instrumental in her career aspirations as the speaker was somebody she could relate to.

“Not only was she muslim like me but she wears a Niqab so she covers her face and she was a woman so seeing someone breaking as many barriers as you can put on a person, which was really impressive. The companies had stalls and it was kind of like a rotation so different companies would come around the tables and talk to us for a bit. I found that really helpful as well as I was speaking to the kind of people that would be interviewing me and the kind of people that would be reading my CV so it was [a] really good opportunity to ask them ‘what do you look for in a candidate? What sort of things makes you think okay this is a good person? What kind of tailoring myself to be the best fit for the position but also allowing me to figure out if this is the kind of company I want to work for?’. Seeing if your goals and your values align with the company was really really useful. I think the task as well, we had a group task, I didn’t have any group tasks for any of the applications I did but I know many people that do, so that would have been quite useful for them as well. I guess just learning to interact with people in general, people your age, people older than you, people in positions that you would like to be in. I think the whole experience was very valuable.”

Samira was able to develop many essential skills as a result of her Uptree experience.

“I would say interpersonal skills, through interacting with people. Collaboration skills because even though in my assessment centre I didn't do any active collaboration, in the role that I'm currently in now, teamwork and having a team mind-set is very helpful. For the [FuturesUP] group project we were [going to] be stranded on a desert [island] and we had to pick 5 items that we would keep with us. Learning how to look at things from an analytical perspective helped me in my current role (in the team: Molecule Quality Analytics) and also having a chance to listen to people and even if you don’t actually agree with their idea, not interrupting them, giving them a chance and hearing them out. I would say the skill it also allowed me to develop is research because as I was seeing different companies mentioning other apprenticeships that I didn't know about that I could possibly be interested in and that was quite useful… I would say networking as well was quite useful to be able to network with people, trying to develop my Linkedin page because it helped me realise how important it is.”

As a young person coming into the world of work Samira found it hard initially to have a work life balance and she experienced a little bit of imposter syndrome.

“You normally compare yourself to your peers who are in uni or I even have a friend who is not in uni so you would compare yourself to other people your age and see what kind of things they are doing. You have less time than them so it’s a bit harder to meet up with friends because you are working 9-5 now 4 days a week. So I would say a challenge I had was I guess not really having a work life balance. It wasn’t that I was a work-a-holic but it was just trying to find that balance between getting what you need to get done at work and also having enough time for yourself and also studying at the same time and attending uni lectures.

I know some people struggle with imposter syndrome and I think it’s something that at least for me I didn’t even realise I was having. It was something that was very subtle but I guess it’s normal. You are working with people who are at the top of their careers and you don’t even have a bachelor's degree and there are things that may be very simple to them but you are having a hard time understanding. So I would say, not being too hard on yourself really helps.”

Samira advises other young people to have faith in themselves and ensure are doing something you enjoy.

“Choose what they like and I know that can be very difficult because even with me, my family was very involved in my life so they can be very vocal about what they want me to do, it can be very confusing when you have different people telling you different things but one thing that I always try to do was even if other people were influencing me, I always made sure that it was something that I was happy with and something that I was willing to do. So even if someone was saying okay do a STEM subject, I needed to make sure that it was a STEM subject that I liked because that is the only thing that keeps you going when things get hard, they remind you that it is enjoyable, you are having a hard time but you truly do enjoy this. Have faith in yourself.”