My Work Experience Placement at Aico

I first learnt about Aico through my school’s careers department when looking for work experience. I was surprised to learn of such a large fire safety company located in the little town of Oswestry.

Through getting in touch with Aico’s Community Liaison, Jane Pritchard, I was invited to a tour of Aico’s headquarters. This allowed me to gain a small insight into the company’s values and goals, as well as their product portfolio.

On my first day of work experience, I spoke to each department and learnt about their jobs and responsibilities. This started in the Warehouse where a member of the team explained everyone’s individual job from picking to packaging orders. I then observed the Sales Team, where I learnt more about their roles and saw first-hand the strong line of communication to the Warehouse which enables Aico to achieve their daily targets. Throughout the day the link between all departments became clearer and it is easy to see how this contributes to a smoothly run business. It is clear that each team member is very passionate about the company and their job.

It was interesting and informative to learn about Aico’s courses to teach electricians how to install their alarms, as well as the community projects that promote the importance of home life safety. I was impressed to see how easy it was to install and connect their detectors, and I was able to have a go myself when I spent time with the Product Development team.

I was intrigued to learn more about their Marketing team, and they were flexible in allowing me to look more deeply into the department. Their job roles varied from Aico TV, which is published monthly on YouTube, to running their social media platforms.

During my time within Marketing, I was given activities to help expand my knowledge and learn new skills in Marketing, such as researching websites and evaluating how user-friendly they are. When I spent time with Aico’s Sales department I was able to listen to calls and see how they managed the customer service side of the job; this was valuable in understanding phone etiquette. I also learnt how to process customer orders, which was key to help meet the sales targets and deliver stock on time.

In conclusion, I have been able to gain insight into how Aico operates internally and externally, learning about their generous charitable donations and volunteering in the community.