30 November 2020
Our 2020 graduates are currently undergoing the “shadowing week” portion of their programme. This is an excellent opportunity for them to get real hands on experience and an insight to what the role entails. This is the first part of a three-blog series in collaboration with different graduates. Today, we caught-up with Ross Meagher to see how his week went.
I joined Property Manager, Jarka Green, in Bristol for a shadowing week in the Property Services division. Our graduate group had already had a run-through of what we could expect in that area of the business by the team’s Director, but that was right at the start of our time at FirstPort, so it was still somewhat of a leap into the unknown.
I had already been given details from Jarka about the properties we would be visiting, so I was able to do my own background research into each of them. We met at our first development on Monday morning and immediately began our inspection. Jarka told me what to look out for, such as clear hallways, neat guttering, and to check for any missing roof tiles (among plenty of other things). Going on to the next site, we spoke more about landscaping issues and identified some trees that may need to be removed. After a debrief of the day, I was told I would be undertaking my own inspections the following morning. Obviously, I felt a lot of pressure to make sure I checked for the right things and would represent FirstPort well when on site. Jarka put me at ease, and by the end of our chat, I was confident of doing a good job.
On Tuesday, I got up and out nice and early. I made sure to look out for the things that Jarka suggested to me, but also took my own initiative on other things like dripping pipes. I made lots of notes and took lots of photo, ready to report back the next day.
On Thursday, I re-joined Jarka to inspect the last remaining developments before my long drive home. I immediately felt more confident from the experiences the week had provided. Before this week, I had only been on a couple of more casual site visits, but it was a completely different experience when I had the responsibility to make sure the sites I visited lived up to FirstPort’s and our customers’ standards.
My biggest takeaway from my week has been an appreciation of the breadth of knowledge a Property Manager in Property Services needs to have about their sites. Jarka gave me advice on the importance of building fantastic relationships with the contractors, who know the developments inside and out and support our Property Managers day in, day out. My next shadowing week is in the Retirement division , and I look forward to learning as much as I have this week.
Stay tuned to see what some of our other graduates had to say about their experience in the coming week
Are you interested in learning more about our graduate 2021 scheme? Click here for more information.
