Why did you decide to bring in a graduate to your team?

Personally, I have only had very good experiences with students, and I have typically been hiring them from local business schools. Generally, the students I have had the pleasure to work with have always contributed with plenty of energy, ideas and skills and they have successfully been driving forward the tasks and projects assigned to them.

Still, to bring in a student is a commitment to take seriously, as you want to make sure you allocate enough time for coaching, in order to properly explain the background and intend with specific projects you involve the student in. This will definitely provide you with better deliverables, and more importantly - it will provide the student with a better learning.

What do you look for in a student?

This time around, we looked for someone with the right skills within Commercial Effectiveness disciplines. So, when we hired Florian, it was important to find someone who had the ability to interpret large and complex data and turn it into something concise and actionable. Therefore, we did a normal hiring due diligence for optimal candidate selection, and we conducted interviews and business case tests with 5 candidates to be sure we chose the best person for the job.

What do you offer your students?

We offer our students a lot. We really treat our students in the same way as any other new employee; and provide them with very interesting and challenging tasks. Therefore, I have no doubt that this also will help the student academically as they develop a more practical lens on their studies.

So, I am proud to say that we at Medtronic are engaging students to create value for us, but more importantly, we take responsibility to develop talents. And no doubt, with the type of learning journey they get exposed to, the student will have a unique foundation for choosing and accelerating their career path in areas where they know they are truly passionate, once ready to take on a full-time job.