School of Business and Law work placements

Your experience

Whether you are a postgraduate or undergraduate student, completing a work placement will mean you’ll be graduating with a year’s relevant work experience – giving you a distinct advantage over others when applying for jobs and starting your career. 

Add to your CV 

Work experience can be a significant part of your education and career development, alongside the academic study of the degree course. A work placement also significantly adds to your CV and many students have received firm job offers, or direct access to graduate schemes. 

Doing a work placement also helps you to build industry contacts that will be invaluable when you graduate.

Support from us  

The Placement Year Team support you through the process of finding, applying for and completing your work placements.

Offering assistance at every stage; from CV writing to mock interviews and techniques, they will also provide ongoing support and guidance, including regular meetings to ensure that everything is going well.

How it works  

One of the benefits of studying at the University of Brighton is the structure of our undergraduate courses to include an optional year-long work placement in the third year.

This helps you put your learning into practice and develops a number of personal and professional skills including communication, problem-solving, confidence building, research and report writing.

Placement years are designed to give you the experience of working in an area associated with your degree. You’ll take part in an interview process for a placement position, and are usually employed on a temporary or fixed term contract for the duration of your placement.

Your work placement project 

As part of your work placement you must complete a work-based project that replaces your final year dissertation and contributes directly to your final degree mark. This will be how your placement year is assessed. 

On our Economics BSc(Hons) course you will still need to complete five final year modules but you will not have to complete a placement project.

The aims of the placement 

By the end of the placement you should: 

• have a thorough understanding of the working environment and ethos
• have developed time management skills and completed specific tasks within set parameters
• be able to manage business relationships and integrate into a team environment
• have contributed positively to the company or department
• have built upon your interpersonal skills and confidence
• have a strong idea of your future career. 

Courses with placements 

The following School of Business and Law courses offer placements as a part of their syllabuses: 

• Accounting and Finance BSc(Hons)
• Finance and Investment BSc(Hons)
• Economics BSc(Hons)
• Business Management with Placement Year BSc(Hons)
• Business Management with Economics and Placement Year BSc(Hons)
• Business Management with Finance and Placement Year BSc(Hons)
• Business Management with Human Resource Management and Placement Year BSc(Hons)
• Business Management with Marketing and Placement Year BSc(Hons)
• International Business Management BSc(Hons)
• Marketing Management with Placement Year BSc(Hons)
• Law LLB (Hons)
• Law with Business LLB(Hons)
• Law with Criminology LLB(Hons)

The following courses can only offer a placement route upon achieving a 60% grade or above in the first year, enabling a transfer to the four-year course option which includes the placement year. If you are taking a degree with an integrated foundation year, you would need to achieve 60% or above in your second year:

• Accounting, Finance and Economics BSc(Hons) with integrated foundation year
• Business Management BSc(Hons)
• Business Management with Economics BSc(Hons)
• Business Management with Finance BSc(Hons)
• Business Management with Human Resource Management BSc(Hons)
• Business Management with Marketing BSc(Hons)
• Business Management BSc(Hons) with integrated foundation year
• Law LLB(Hons) with integrated foundation year
• Marketing Management BSc(Hons)

How to find a placement 

We recommend that undergraduate students should start looking early in their second year. Whilst a placement isn’t guaranteed, our dedicated Placements Year Team will support all students throughout the process of finding, applying for and completing their work placement.

Whilst the team will assist you in finding a suitable placement, giving you support and access to placement opportunities and recruitment fairs, you are responsible for applying for as many positions as possible to help your chances of successfully getting a placement.

Careers Connect 

As a School of Business and Law student you will have access to Careers Connect, an online placements system presenting placement options in the UK and Europe. It gathers together all the job opportunities, events and resources you need to help you with your professional development.

Placement fairs 

Placement fairs are held twice a year involving companies from well-known names such as Enterprise-Rent-a-Car, Nike, BMW and IBM, through to smaller and more local businesses.

Employability weeks 

Our regular Employability Weeks offer activities designed to enhance your employability, including LinkedIn workshops, sessions on working abroad, advice from the university’s volunteering service and support from the wider university Careers team. 

How it works 

Postgraduate courses with an integrated paid placement year are available to full-time applicants who start their course in September. 

You will take part in an interview process for a placement position with an organisation, and if you are successful, you are usually employed on a temporary or fixed term contract for the duration of your placement. 

Whilst your masters with placement will take two years, the work placement gives you the chance to apply your learning to real-life situations and challenges, to meet and network with potential employers, and have opportunities to get work experience in your area of expertise before you graduate – something that employers value highly. 

During your placement you will also complete a business project. This project is assessed as part of your masters and, depending on the topic that is agreed between you and your employer, could also provide a valuable piece of insight for your placement employer. 

Our placement partners include BMW, Bosch, Disney, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, HSBC, IBM, Ipsos Mori, L’Oréal, Nike, Metropolitan Police and The Pensions Regulator. 

Your work placement project

As part of your work placement you will complete a work-based project that replaces your final year project and contributes directly to your final masters degree mark. This is how your placement year is assessed, and is worth 40 credits. 

Courses with placements 

The placement option is only available to full-time students who start in September on the following courses: 

• Brighton MBA
• Economics and Finance MSc
• Finance and Accounting MSc
• Finance and Banking MSc
• Finance and Investment MSc
• Finance and Risk Management MSc
• International Management MSc
• Management MSc
• Management (Human Resources) MSc
• Management (Entrepreneurship) MSc
• Marketing MSc
• Marketing (International Marketing) MSc
• Marketing (Digital Marketing) MSc
• Marketing (Branding and Communication) MSc

The majority of our postgraduate courses offer the option of a placement year. The following courses do not offer a placement due to the structure of the course, or accrediting body requirements.

• Accounting (ACCA) MSc
• Diploma in Professional Studies in Accounting (ACCA) 
• International Law and Social Justice LLM
• Law Conversion LLM

International students

Our two-year masters are available to UK, EU and international students. If you are an international student, you will not require a work visa because the placement is part of your studies.

Please contact us for more information about our two-year international study visa route for our masters with placement courses.

How to find a placement 

We offer the same placement support to all our students, and recommend that masters students book a discussion with a member of our Placements Year Team at the end of their first term.

Placements are not automatically guaranteed and it is a competitive process similar to making job applications.

Whilst the team will assist you in finding a suitable placement, giving you support and access to placement opportunities and recruitment fairs, you are responsible for applying for as many positions as possible to help your chances of successfully getting a placement.

Careers Connect

As a School of Business and Law student you will have access to Careers Connect, an online placements system presenting placement options in the UK and Europe. It gathers together all the job opportunities, events and resources you need to help you with your professional development.

Placement and recruitment events 

Placement fairs are held twice a year involving companies from well-known names such as Enterprise-Rent-a-Car, Nike, BMW and IBM, through to smaller and more local businesses.

Our regular Employability Weeks offer activities designed to enhance your employability, including LinkedIn workshops, sessions on working abroad, advice from the university’s volunteering service and support from the wider university Careers team. 

Nhung Nguyen 

Athanasios Darras