Job description
Site Name:UK - Hertfordshire - Ware, UK - County Durham - Barnard Castle, UK - Hertfordshire - Stevenage
Posted Date:Sep 25 2024

Roles Available in Location:Stevenage, Ware, Barnard Castle

Education required: 

To apply for this placement, you must be:

Currently studying an Undergraduate Degree in Engineering: Mechanical Engineering, Facilities Engineering, Automation Engineering, Electrical Engineering.

Please read the degree requirements for each role carefully before applying.

Other requirements:  You will have completed a minimum of 2 years of your undergraduate degree but will not have graduated at the start of your placement. You must be enrolled at a UK (United Kingdom) or ROI (Republic of Ireland) University for the duration of your placement.

If you have already graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree and are currently studying a postgraduate Masters, you are not eligible for this programme.

Language requirement:Written and spoken fluency in English

Expected Start date:July 2025

Duration:1 year (approximately)

Salary:  A salary of £24,700 plus a bonus.

Application Closing:16th October 2024

Early applications are encouraged as candidates will be reviewed regularly and the advert may close at any point.

Are you looking to gain valuable real world work experience and help positively impact the lives of others?

A GSK internship offers you the opportunity to kickstart your career – to take on a real role with genuine impact. You’ll take on challenging tasks within live projects or assignments.  You’ll also get to learn from others in your team and other parts of GSK whilst developing your skills and gaining valuable experience for wherever the future takes you.

Typical skills you can expect to learn on this placement will include:

• Teamworking through working with multidisciplinary teams

• Communication (written & verbal)

• Time management

• Problem-solving

• Networking

• Data analysis and management

• Technical skills (detailed within each role description)

Once you accept your offer you will be invited to join LinkedIn groups and pre-joining webinars, to enable you to connect and network with new students. You will join IPUnite, GSK’s community of over 250 students across all UK sites and business areas, run by the Industrial Placement students committee and will receive access to GSK resources, including employee assistance programmes, private healthcare, and well-being programs.

The Roles (3 available)

This advert contains multiple roles. Please read each role carefully before proceeding as you will be asked to provide a preference later in the application process.

Role 1 – Barnard Castle

Degree requirements – Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Building Services Engineering

Overview of the Department

The Barnard Castle site is in the Northeast of England and is sited within the County Durham countryside. Barnard Castle is a key secondary site for GSK with a large number of New Products coming through development at site. We manufacture and supply a huge range of different pharmaceutical products from Sterile Products (Syringes and Vials) to Liquid Inhalations and Dermatologicals. We have recently opened a new state of the art aseptic digital facility producing biopharmaceuticals.

This role will provide you with an opportunity to work alongside an experienced automation engineering team and digital technology teams to deliver capital projects within a highly regulated environment.

Key Placement activities

• Help the site team with automation capital project delivery for new equipment and digital systems.

• Provide business system support to front line teams for new systems.

• Upgrade existing platforms and help deliver cyber security upgrades.

• Work with digital technology teams to deliver machine integration to cloud data analytics platforms, which support machine learning and AI projects.

• Develop skills with automation systems such as PLCs, HMIs, Distributed Control System (DCS) and Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) based equipment using Siemens S7/PCS7; and OPC systems such as Kepware, Manufacturing Execution System (MES) systems based on Aspentech.

Role 2 – Ware

Degree requirements: Mechanical Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Electrical Engineering

Overview of the Department

RSC Assembly Engineering manage and improve the Assembly platforms to enable maximum production opportunity. Managing maintenance, breakdowns, obsolescence programs, capital projects and equipment performance to maximise business benefit and strategic objectives.

Key Placement Activities

• Change management (Change controls)

• Identification and development of business cases for continuous improvement Root cause analysis

• Supporting design for equipment upgrades

• Leading meetings

• Document updates

• Stakeholder management

• Change management

Role 3 – Stevenage

Degree requirements – Mechanical, Electrical, Environmental, Automation, Building Services, Process/ Chemical, Fire Safety

Overview of the Department

RDES provides facilities management, engineering and capital project services tailored to the needs of R&D.  We collaborate with our suppliers to ensure our environments are safe, reliable, compliant and sustainable.  As a global function we support over 13,000 people across 19 sites in 6 countries, covering 4.7 million sq ft with a budget in excess of £400m per annum. 

The industrial placement role will sit within RDES’ global engineering team which oversees engineering standards & compliance; lifecycle asset management; energy & sustainability; capital planning & processes; and a range of other cross-departmental projects.

You will work with and learn from an experienced team of multi-disciplinary engineers. Throughout the year, they will coach and mentor you to help you reach your full potential. On every project and from every person you encounter, there is something to learn and build new or pre-existing talents

You will collaborate closely with everyone in the team on a number of projects taking place on site, ranging from installation projects, calibration, cyber security and environmental projects to meet GSK's 2030 Environmental and Sustainability Targets.

Key Placement activities

An Engineering placement in one of our sites will give you hands-on practical application of the theory from university. Our sites are key cutting-edge Research & Development facilities within GSK.

• Developing a thorough understanding of the equipment, plant and processes used at the site including design of systems and the ability to problem solve

• Utilise Specialist Engineering Software

• Replacing and innovating existing systems on site

• Supporting delivery of the Engineering, Inspection and Reliability programmes.

• Investigating new engineering technologies to improve plant and maintenance techniques

• Development and implementation of maintenance best practice

• Specifying new equipment and components

• Performing root cause analysis investigations

• Contributing to safety and quality risk assessments

• Carrying out continuous improvement activities to ensure good engineering practice

• Developing skills for leading and managing groups of peers or contractors to achieve the above

• Developing skills in project management and planning

These placement opportunities have the following recruitment stages you must successfully pass to

be offered a placement year with GSK for 2024:

1.           Eligibility Form

2.           World of GSK Online Assessment

3.           Written Assessment

4.           Virtual Assessment Centre or Virtual Interview

You’ll find hints, tips and guidance on our recruitment process on our websitehere.

You can learn more about GSK and our careershere.

Apply now!

We’re 100% open to all talent – whatever your gender, marital status, religion, age, colour, race, sexual orientation, nationality, learning difference or disability. We want to recruit the right people for GSK from the widest possible backgrounds, so we can better serve the diversity of our patients and also because it’s the right thing to do.

You can learn more about Inclusion and diversity at GSKhere.

Need help with your application?

Please email us at or call us on and let us know how we can help you.

#GSKIndustrialPlacements #GSKEngineeringPlacements #GSKGlobalSupplyChainPlacements #GSKStevenage #GSKWare #GSKBarnardCastle #GSKNorthEast #IndustrialPlacements#EarlyCareers #UKEarlyCareers

Why GSK?

Uniting science, technology and talent to get ahead of disease together.

GSK is a global biopharma company with a special purpose – to unite science, technology and talent to get ahead of disease together – so we can positively impact the health of billions of people and deliver stronger, more sustainable shareholder returns – as an organisation where people can thrive. We prevent and treat disease with vaccines, specialty and general medicines. We focus on the science of the immune system and the use of new platform and data technologies, investing in four core therapeutic areas (infectious diseases, HIV, respiratory/ immunology and oncology).

Our success absolutely depends on our people. While getting ahead of disease together is about our ambition for patients and shareholders, it’s also about making GSK a place where people can thrive. We want GSK to be a place where people feel inspired, encouraged and challenged to be the best they can be. A place where they can be themselves – feeling welcome, valued, and included. Where they can keep growing and look after their wellbeing. So, if you share our ambition, join us at this exciting moment in our journey to get Ahead Together.

As an Equal Opportunity Employer, we are open to all talent. In the US, we also adhere to Affirmative Action principles. This ensures that all qualified applicants will receive equal consideration for employment without regard to neurodiversity, race/ethnicity, colour, national origin, religion, gender, pregnancy, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity/expression, age, disability, genetic information, military service, covered/protected veteran status or any other federal, state or local protected class*(*US only).

We believe in an agile working culture for all our roles. If flexibility is important to you, we encourage you to explore with our hiring team what the opportunities are.

Please don’t hesitate to contact us if you’d like to discuss any reasonable adjustments to our process which might help you demonstrate your strengths and capabilities.

For UK Intern roles (including Industrial Placements) you can either call us on , or send an email

For UK Apprentice and Graduate Programme roles you can either call us on , or send an email

As you apply, we will ask you to share some personal information which is entirely voluntary. We want to have an opportunity to consider a diverse pool of qualified candidates and this information will assist us in meeting that objective and in understanding how well we are doing against our inclusion and diversity ambitions. We would really appreciate it if you could take a few moments to complete it.  Rest assured, Hiring Managers do not have access to this information and we will treat your information confidentially.

Important notice to Employment businesses/ Agencies

GSK does not accept referrals from employment businesses and/or employment agencies in respect of the vacancies posted on this site. All employment businesses/agencies are required to contact GSK's commercial and general procurement/human resources department to obtain prior written authorization before referring any candidates to GSK. The obtaining of prior written authorization is a condition precedent to any agreement (verbal or written) between the employment business/ agency and GSK. In the absence of such written authorization being obtained any actions undertaken by the employment business/agency shall be deemed to have been performed without the consent or contractual agreement of GSK. GSK shall therefore not be liable for any fees arising from such actions or any fees arising from any referrals by employment businesses/agencies in respect of the vacancies posted on this site.

Please note that if you are a US Licensed Healthcare Professional or Healthcare Professional as defined by the laws of the state issuing your license, GSK may be required to capture and report expenses GSK incurs, on your behalf, in the event you are afforded an interview for employment. This capture of applicable transfers of value is necessary to ensure GSK’s compliance to all federal and state US Transparency requirements. For more information, please visit GSK’s Transparency Reporting For the Recordsite.