Personal Experience Florian Brix

Great experience and more challenges to come

After I finished my studies I was keen to get involved in a challenging and international work environment. As I already gained some interesting insights in the energy industry during my studies, an international player in this business would have been my first choice to start my career. Furthermore, I always enjoyed linking economical and technical aspects in my studies and I was hoping to do so in my first job. Last but not least, even though I was clearly aware that I only start my career and that I still had to learn a lot, I hoped to be able to contribute to my new work environment and to be able to realise small projects on my own. When I applied for the International Graduate Programme (IGP) in 2007, the cover of the IGP booklet did not yet say “room for your career to grow” but that was exactly the impression that I got during the application process and that I still have. The programme has proved as a great opportunity to start my career, to be challenged and to receive strong support at the same time, to grow by doing!

It is great to have room to grow and to be challenged to think outside the box when you start your career. At the same time I personally want to emphasize how important ongoing support and a certain continuity was to me over the last 18 months. Throughout the whole programme I experienced great support from the programme coordinators at RWE AG, from my mentor who found time for some advice when needed and from a professional coach that helped me to reflect about previous experience. I also consider the actual and previous generations of graduates as well as several colleagues that I got to know through my different projects as the most important source of support and continuity. However, I think now it is time to get more specific and to tell you how all this came together in my latest IGP project.

Since I started the graduate programme it was clear to me that I wanted to do a project in the area of onshore or offshore wind. By the end of 2007, the wind business of RWE was mainly located in the UK, where the RWE company nPower Renewables is an established player in renewable energy, including onshore and offshore wind. Another graduate from RWE Power that I got to know through my first project had done one of his earlier placements at nPower Renewables and so I asked him for the right colleagues to contact in order to realise my project there. When I then met the colleagues from offshore development in the UK both sides were clearly interested in working together, so we soon agreed on a work package for my placement and I started my project at the end of October 2008. Over the first weeks I got involved in the economic assessment of future large offshore wind farms where I learnt a lot in working together with several colleagues from commercial as well as technical functions. Subsequently, I did a more detailed desk study on how different array layouts and spacings between turbines impact on the energy capture of large offshore wind farms. The results fitted into actual development projects of my colleagues and provided me with a good understanding of wind farms in a difficult offshore environment. As I then got the possibility to extend my project and to get more involved in the preparation of a bid for a large offshore wind farm I decided to stay longer.

In the meantime, I have spent more than 4 months in the UK and we are just about to hand in our first bidding document next week, which also means that my project is nearly over. It was a great experience to work here, to contribute to bringing forward offshore development and to experience great support from my colleagues in the UK and Germany, where our offshore team is strongly increasing in size. Furthermore, I had the opportunity to work together with colleagues from offshore operations and to spend two days at the operations base port for our offshore wind farm North Hoyle in North Wales – a great experience!

As I just write this report my graduate programme is nearly over. In my other previous projects, three of them in Germany and one in the Czech Republic, I got to know many other supportive colleagues and they provided me with much more interesting insights, ranging from transmission grid assets, over gas sales to climate protection. I really enjoyed the work on projects that shape the future approach to generation in Europe and so only recently decided to join RWE Innogy after my graduate scheme. I am confident that I can learn a lot in this next step and, to be honest, now I am really excited to get involved in one area for longer than three to four months.

Good luck with your application.