Chapter 43 — Industry or public-service practice
Lesson map
Lesson 43 published. Map, example, EX127.
flowchart TD
N0["Learning outcomes"]
N1["43.1 Placement"]
N2["43.2 Governance"]
N3["43.3 Supervision"]
N4["43.4 Professional conduct"]
N5["43.5 Delivery"]
N6["Daily work"]
N7["Rollout steps"]
N0 --> N1 --> N2 --> N3 --> N4 --> N5 --> N6 --> N7
N7 --> EX["Worked example"]
EX --> Q["Exercise EX127"]
Logical drawing
flowchart LR
N0["Learning outcomes"]
N1["43.1 Placement"]
N2["43.2 Governance"]
N3["43.3 Supervision"]
N4["43.4 Professional conduct"]
N5["43.5 Delivery"]
N6["Daily work"]
N7["Rollout steps"]
N0 --> N1 --> N2 --> N3 --> N4 --> N5 --> N6 --> N7 --> Q["EX127"]
[Learning outcomes]
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v
[43.1 Placement]
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v
[43.2 Governance]
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v
[43.3 Supervision]
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v
[43.4 Professional conduct]
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v
[43.5 Delivery]
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v
[Daily work]
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v
[Rollout steps]
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v
[Worked example] --> [Exercise EX127]
Learning outcomes
You will (1) work within a public-service organisation; (2) follow its governance; (3) deliver under supervision.
43.1 Placement
Mateo spends a term at Fernhill supporting deployment to all branches.
During the placement Mateo works at Fernhill four days a week and spends the fifth at the institute. His tasks are agreed with Marta at the start and written into the placement plan: branch rollouts, the morning checks with the technician, documentation and answering librarians' questions. The placement is also where the capstone's design meets daily operation, so much of what he learns feeds back into the thesis. Marta signs the plan.
43.2 Governance
Changes go through Fernhill's change board; data handling follows its privacy policy.
The change board meets weekly and approves each rollout, image release and firewall change. Mateo presents his changes there with the test evidence and the rollback plan. The privacy policy decides what data he may see and keep, which is why his notes contain no patron details. Working within these processes takes longer than acting directly, but every change is visible and can be traced later. Mateo attends every meeting.
43.3 Supervision
Marta supervises daily; Dr Novak reviews weekly.
Daily supervision means Marta sees each change before it reaches a branch and can stop anything she doubts. Dr Novak's weekly review looks at the work from the course's side: whether Mateo's evidence supports his claims and whether the work connects to the thesis. The two supervisors meet once in the middle of the term to compare views, and both sign the placement report at the end. Their feedback is written down, so Mateo can check his progress against it.
43.4 Professional conduct
Mateo does not access patron accounts and works only on approved tasks.
Mateo's account has no access to the booking system or to patron data, and he does not ask for it. When a librarian asked him to look up which patron had used a PC, he declined and referred her to the branch manager. Approved tasks are listed in the placement plan; anything else needs Marta's agreement first. He logs every administrative session on production systems. Marta reviews the log weekly.
43.5 Delivery
All three branches move to the new design during the term.
The rollout followed the order agreed with the change board, with Millbrook first and the branch that asked to delay during exams last. Each branch went through the same checklist and a week of monitoring. By the end of the term all three hundred public PCs ran the new design. Mateo recorded the date and the result of each branch's end-to-end tests in the rollout log. No branch opened late.
Daily work
During the placement, Mateo's days include checking restore reports with the technician, preparing branch rollouts, answering librarians' questions and updating documentation. He keeps a daily log of tasks and lessons, which later feeds the dossier.
He learns how public-service constraints shape engineering: budgets are fixed, timing depends on community needs and every change must be explained to non-specialists.
Rollout steps
Each branch rollout follows a checklist: notify staff, deploy after closing, run end-to-end tests, monitor for a week.
Feedback
Marta's mid-term feedback asks for shorter emails to librarians, which he adopts.
Boundaries
He never works alone on production systems.
Reflection
Mateo reflects that the placement taught him to plan around people as much as technology.
Evidence
Placement records join the dossier.
Supervision value
Weekly reviews with Dr Novak help Mateo connect placement work to course concepts.
Placement report
He writes a placement report for the institute.
Skills gained
He gains skills in change management, stakeholder communication and working under supervision in a live service.
Closing
Marta provides a written reference describing his work and conduct.
Daily log
His log records each task and lesson.
Worked example
A branch manager asks to delay rollout during a busy exam period. The change board agrees, and the branch goes last.
Synthetic case. Synthetic.
Errors and limits
Ignoring local timing can damage trust even if the change is good.
Exercises
- EX127 — Governance. Which governance applied? Rubric: 3 = change board, privacy policy; 2 = partial; 1 = vague; 0 = none.
- EX128 — Conduct. What did Mateo avoid? Rubric: 3 = patron accounts, unapproved tasks; 2 = partial; 1 = vague; 0 = none.
- EX129 — Delay. How was the exam-period request handled? Rubric: 3 = branch went last; 2 = partial; 1 = vague; 0 = none.
Synthesis
Work within the organisation's governance and timing.
Continue studying — chapter 43 of 50
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