ESO Graduate Rachael Eynon is named National Grid Group Grad of the Year
12 Apr 2021 - 3 minute read
As one of the ESO’s graduates, Rachael Eynon has been able to work in different areas of our business and learn a lot about how we work. Out of her cohort, Rachael was chosen as “Grad of the Year” for her excellent work with her fellow graduates and more widely in the business and community.
She is now an Outage Planner in the North Outage Planning Team:
An outage involves taking an asset offline, out of the network, in order to perform maintenance or testing on it to ensure it is in good condition to be used in our network. We take requests from the Transmission Owners and Distribution Network Operators and assess those against our existing outage plan to ensure we can continue to operate the network safely. It involves a lot of liaising with customers to check they are ok with the requests and also some analysis using our power systems software. We also have a big focus on consumer value and keeping costs low.
What made you choose the graduate scheme at the ESO?
When I was at university, I spent my summers doing various 8-week placements around National Grid which gave me a real insight into the company. From that I was then offered a place on the graduate scheme which was when I chose to join the ESO specifically.
Tell us a bit more about the ESO graduate scheme.
The scheme is made up of three six-month placements and takes on about 50 graduates each year. My first placement was in the ESO because that was my chosen area, but then I spent six months with the sustainability team. Getting to do a non-engineering role and meet people I wouldn’t have met otherwise was a great opportunity.
Read: A day in the life of an ESO graduate
Whilst on the scheme I did a lot of work as a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) ambassador and pre-Covid I supported a local robotics school event. I also supported the ESO innovation event in Birmingham and helped at some of the assessment centres for the future graduate intakes.
I organised a lot of activities for the graduate cohort as well and took part in various projects to help improve the graduate scheme for future participants.
We were really lucky that we were able to establish that group of friends before the pandemic really hit, so although we spent a lot of the scheme working from home, we already had that network of fellow grads to support us. We’ve really kept each other going.
What can you tell us about the Grad of the Year award?
Other graduates in the cohort vote for the award across various criteria including leadership potential, being a team player and volunteering contributions. All of the nominations are then pulled together to find the graduate of the year.
On the last day of the scheme, it was announced that I had been voted Grad of the Year across the whole of National Grid Group - it was really nice to get that recognition from everyone on the scheme.
As part of the award, I have won the chance to go to the One Young World Summit, which I’m really looking forward to. Restrictions allowing, I’ll be going to Munich later this year to take part in the event where people from all over the world will come together to discuss the issues affecting our planet – I can’t wait.
Climate change is something I’m passionate about, so being invited to this event is an amazing opportunity. In my role, I learn a lot about this issue from a UK perspective but it will be great to hear from people from all over the world.