They keep you happy by plying you with beer and talk of great careers, so that you will write shining reviews whilst at the academy - obviously this appeals to people who have just left university. After 4 weeks of training, you are locked in for 2 years - thats a very long time when it comes to it.
The training at the academy is very basic. The trainers had absolutely no idea what would be expected of us on client sites, since most of them are just graduates who have gone through the training themselves and become teachers without ever having been on site. I was certainly not prepared for work client-side.
QA consultants who have gone through the academy seem to be a bit of a joke in the industry. Clients have come to realise that we have a steep learning curve when coming on site. There is a bit of a running joke where I am about how little we get paid.
You will be sad at how much contractors around you get paid for doing pretty much the same job. Money doesnt mean a great deal to me, but it would be nice to be able to rent a flat in London (where I have unfortunately been placed) and not have to choose between food or a social life. The newly instated 'london bonus' goes almost no way to closing the london living gap, at about £130 extra per month after tax.
The laptop supplied by QA is the sort of thing your grandpa might buy to just 'surf the web', it certainly hasnt got the agility required to sustain an IT professional's workflow.
Heres the big one: If you want to leave within your two year contract they slap a 'training fee' on your head which, although was transparent from the start, seems unfair in hindsight - since £6,000 is what I payed for almost 2 years of university, and there was no way of knowing that the training would be of such poor quality.
If, like me, you were drawn in by the prospect of programming/development, steer clear of this place. They put you on any technology they want, and it is almost entirely down to them - they don't represent you by your strengths, just what jobs they think they might get in the future. I do not enjoy my job, and dont know many people who are satisfied.
