INSPIRING APPRENTICES - INTERVIEW WITH MASON
14:07By Miranda Reilly
Mason Malin, Security Patrol Officer and Past Apprentice
Mason completed an apprenticeship as a security patrol officer in 2016 with OUSS, Oxford University Security Services, and now works in this position full time. He loves his job, and says there's rarely a day he goes home wishing he hadn't been at work. He particularly enjoys getting to pass on knowledge to new members of staff.
Mason in his uniform at the Old Observatory, where Security Services is based. |
·
Tell us a
bit about yourself, what do you enjoy?
Well, I love football as a start,
and going out with my friends – I’m quite a social person, so I like being with
mates, whether that’s watching football or something else. I support Arsenal,
not so much Oxford United! I also used to be a pool player! … Before this role,
I was at college. When I was 17, 18, I was doing manufacturing and engineering: I
did well in it but I didn’t like it, I found it easy to study but a bit boring.
So this was a big turn in my career.
·
So how
exactly did you come across your apprenticeship here?
When I finished college I wasn’t keen to
carry on, I wanted new opportunities. I always thought an apprenticeship would
be better than university, so I looked for opportunities. I saw one opportunity
which was closer to what I studied at college: things like 3D modelling at a
local company. I was on the verge of getting that, but the company lost
funding, so I was back to square one. Then I saw the University: the advert for
the apprenticeship looked really dynamic. I think I just saw it online when I
typed in apprenticeships. With security, I thought it would need quite a
motivated mindset and I like solving problems, problem-solving. I got asked for
an interview after being shortlisted, and heard back the same day, even though
I was told they’d take about a week to get back to me! It must have been about
a month and a half after that that I started at the job. My apprenticeship was
a year, and I did a Customer Service NVQ. The customer service course was quite
different to security, but we’re becoming more focused on customer service here
now so it’s heavily involved in what we do.
·
And are
you from the local area?
Yeah, Watlington – it’s about 25 minutes away.
It’s one of the smallest towns in the UK. I could drive at the time as well, so
it wasn’t very far.
· You now
have a permanent role at OUSS. Were you offered it straight away following on
from your internship?
Well nine months into my apprenticeship it
was up in the air, since the apprenticeships scheme was new to my department.
There were four of us, and they kept two. When there were about two months left
to go, they said the contract would just role over, and it did just like that.
Clive [the Apprenticeships Manager] hosted an award ceremony at the Sheldonian
Theatre – that was brilliant. So it was a pretty smooth transition once I was
asked.
·
Is your
current job very different to your apprenticeship, or similar?
In terms of difference… the job not so
much. It’s very much the department that’s changing. We got a Customer Service Accreditation,
so we’re now more orientated around customers, so what I studied goes well with
what we’re aiming for. So it’s not too different, but new staff have come in
and there’s a little more responsibility for me. There’s a training programme
that’s been set up, so some staff give the training like a tutor. I get to
share my knowledge with new people, and it gives people confidence. I’m not
told how to do things anymore but I’m asked ‘Mason, can you do this please?’
because I know how to do it.
·
Do you
enjoy that mentoring role of getting to pass on your knowledge to new staff?
Very much so. Looking forward, I would like
to take up one of the tutor roles if they offer it to me. The support I’ve had
and everything has been really good, and it’s very much my mindset to help
people out and do my best. So, I’d very much like that to happen.
·
Could you
talk me through an average day in your job?
Hm, an average day – there isn’t one,
really. But… we come in at about 6.30 in the morning, then there’s a briefing
at 7 from our supervisor – so any ongoing events, anything that happened
overnight, what has happened on stand-down days – so we know what’s going on.
We know what commitments we have like ‘Can you go and assist this person at
that time’ and general commitments for the day – it might be unlocking and
locking the parks, which means a nice walk around the parks to freshen you up, or
locking buildings, or you might be in the control room which is alarm
monitoring, radios, phone calls, CCTV monitoring: that’s what I’m doing this
morning. We’ll be working this weekend, but that’s part and parcel of the job.
So you know what you’re doing and you’re briefed up. During the day on patrol
high visibility is important, to give people that reassurance, making sure a
response comes through when an intruder alarm goes off. It’s very much a mix. The
night shift is completely different, there’s everything going on in the city,
so there’s the people to deal with, the welfare of students, making sure they
get home safe. There’s a lot of bike crime in Oxford – that’s a major one – and
a lot of the crime happens on our property, so we’re involved in that, we get
requests from police for CCTV footage.
·
So it
sounds like a huge amount of variety?
Yeah, you get break-ins sometimes: I’ve
experienced it all. I haven’t even been here two years and I’ve had so much
experience, which is good from a careers point of view. I know what to do, and
how to do it because I’ve done it before. It’s quite reassuring – it’s a bit
daunting at first but you’re always with an experienced person.
·
Do you
always work in a team or is there a lot of solo work?
Yeah, there’s your supervisor and deputy
supervisor. In the control room there’s you, a colleague, and your supervisor,
and on the beats, there’s three beats, all crewed up in twos. However, if there’s
sickness or staff shortages you sometimes work alone, but you’re never sent
where an intruder might be on your own. We have a radio network, where you
press a button every so often so in the control room they can see you and make
sure you’re alright. So there’s quite a variety – and when you’re on a job, it’s
just you two so you decide if you split off to do separate tasks. Teamwork is
key to making sure there’s good communication on the job and in the control
room, especially since you might have to call someone out: police, a fire
engine, an ambulance.
·
Do you
get on well with your team?
Definitely. Unfortunately I’m moving teams
in a few weeks but that’s part of the job – it happens. I definitely get on
with my team, they brought me here from an apprentice, so there’s that
confidence factor: I have confidence in them and they have confidence in me. We
rely on each other.
·
Do you have
a favourite place in Oxford?
I like how historic Oxford is, there really
is so much history. There’s the museums, the Ashmolean you can look around, the
Radcliffe Camera and the Bodleian – there’s really a lot of meaning behind
that. The colleges as well: so many people have been to them – political people
and other names you’ve heard of. So the history interests me, the University in
general, not really a specific place.
·
So do you
do a lot of work with the colleges or mainly departments?
Yeah, the colleges call us quite a bit,
because they have porters but not security – we provide the security to them.
So again, there’s that interworking between colleges and us, departments and
us: it’s the key to making sure it all rolls smoothly.
· What
advice would you have for someone interested in an apprenticeship or a similar
role to you?
… Not to be contained, to go in open-minded,
and give yourself that opportunity. I didn’t know what I was getting into at
first, and I’m really happy now I’m here. So look at the opportunity – you can
move around as well, if you go in and do your year, you can always move around
if you don’t like it, we have so many apprentices in Estates: it’s not like
moving to a different job, you’re moving within the university. So it allows
that diversity. The main thing is to go in open-minded.
· What
would you say to other departments that aren’t sure if they should have
apprentices or not?
I think I’d say, and I’m going by what
people have said at our department, that it’s great for bringing in fresh ideas
from a younger generation. Although you don’t have to be younger to do an
apprenticeship, generally people are, so there’s that new knowledge – they appreciate
me in the control room for being able to type fast, with the IT side of things.
And again, there are fresh ideas when you’re bringing in not just people who
have been in the field for 40 years. It’s also a great platform for getting
people into jobs, it’s not expensive and you get someone who really wants to
work. Not many people come into apprenticeships thinking they’re planning to
leave, they want to pursue something and stay on. A lot of departments will be
surprised: if you’re not sure just go ahead with it. When I first came, my
department thought, you know the stereotype: here’s an 18-year-old guy, will he
be turning up early on a Saturday morning? It’s easy to stereotype. It’s great
to really prove yourself. Ask other departments about their experiences of
working with apprentices.
·
What
would you say the highlight of your time so far has been?
a It's yet to come! Every day has been great. It's a great team, and a great department. I put myself out there and showed this is what I can do: it would be a loss if you lost me. So there's not a particular highlight, it's always good, always enjoyable. I rarely go home and think 'I wish I wasn't in work today.' I want to come to work, I'm not in a job where I don't enjoy it and am just doing it for the money. I have a job that pays well and I'm happy in it. It's just proof of the longevity of apprenticeships. I've said to my department instead of just looking for seven full-time staff, get a few more apprentices in, look for five full-time and two apprentices.
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