The document discusses the author's work experience as a Sales Advisor at River Island and how it helped develop skills applicable to their prospective career as a clinical scientist. As a Sales Advisor, the author gained skills in time management, communication, patience, discretion, confidentiality, and multitasking by serving customers, completing tasks, and meeting sales quotas. These skills will aid their career in areas like conducting investigations in a timely manner, communicating professionally with patients, maintaining patient privacy, and handling multiple tasks simultaneously.

1. Work
Experience
Professional and Scientific Practice 3

2. Intro
• Work experience in the form of part time work in conjunction with
studies helps develop vital soft skills which can be transferred
into a career in Biomedical Science.
• I will be using my experience working in a famous high street
retailer to extrapolate my transferrable skills into the workplace
environment I wish to pursue.

3. Job Title and Responsibilities
• Working as a Sales Advisor at River Island in Meadowhall Shopping
Centre is a fast paced environment as we frequently ranked in the
top 3 River Island stores in the UK for weekly sales.
• Being a Sales Advisor you must be outgoing and be able to
confidently speak to customers and help them find what they are
looking for, and advise them on fashion sense.
• Other standard retail duties are in the job description including;
serving customers on the till, clearing clothes from the fitting rooms,
checking stock, store orders, upkeeping shop floor standards,
delivery, meeting E-receipt quotas, ensuring customer and staff
safety with fire and terrorism procedures, and minimising stock loss.

4. Skills Developed
• Time management and organisation – Working and meeting
deadlines for university assignments
• Communication – Speaking to strangers in a friendly, positive
manner, even in circumstances where customers are being
confrontational, whilst also maintaining a professional standard,
this also applies to peers and superiors.
• Patience – Waiting and helping customers make decisions
regarding their purchase.
• Discretion and confidentiality – Ensuring customer privacy is
respected and maintained, making sure customer information is
kept private and not shared with anyone.
• Multitasking – Being able to serve customers promptly whilst
also ensuring all other duties are completed as required.

5. Links to Prospective Career
• My dream career is to become a clinical scientist and many of the
transferrable skills I developed in retail will aid me in this career.
• Time management and organisation will be vital, ensuring I will
be able to conduct necessary investigations in a timely and
organised manner to meet patients needs and ensure the
laboratory is tidy and organised for safety purposes.
• Communication in a polite and professional manner with the
general public is important to ensure they understand your
results, this also applies with workplace colleagues.
• Patience when dealing with patients and conducting
investigations is vital as procedures must not be rushed.

6. Links to Prospective Career (cont.)
• Discretion and confidentiality is one of the most important
aspects of healthcare, patient information, medical history,
treatment and illness must always be kept confidential and must
never be shared without permission.
• Multitasking is an important skill as I will need to be carrying out
various investigations for different patients and on different
sample types which will take varying lengths of time to conduct.

7. Outro
• Balancing a job and doing your degree at the same time is hard
work and can be very stressful.
• The reward of developing vital soft skills can make it worth it as
it can help you stand out in the job market and can help you
adjust to the responsibilities of a full time career.