Don’t be afraid to follow your dreams, but don’t be surprised if they change along the way!

If only picking your future was as simple as flicking through the pages of a brochure…

When Enshore Subsea’s Sarah Cruickshank hit a career blank that’s exactly what she ended up doing. After leaving school with one set of plans which quickly went sour, Sarah sat for an afternoon and painstakingly went through the prospectus for her local college. “Flipping through the pages saying no, no, no, until I landed on one that I thought sounded interesting, and the rest is history!”

Initially Sarah had planned to be a draughtsperson so had signed up for an engineering course at college, “I’d loved graphic communication at school, and the traditional manual draughting skills we’d learnt there: I thought I’d decided on the perfect career choice. When I started the course and realised that it was very CAD focused it was much less appealing.”?

After leaving the course nine months in, Sarah started working at a high-street clothing store in Aberdeen whilst she figured out what she wanted to do. “Despite it being a quick stop gap after leaving college, I ended up staying for two years--I enjoyed the 50% staff discount too much! It took a while to push myself to realise I needed to go and do something else or I would end up staying there for ever, I knew that wouldn’t be right for me in the long run.”

That day when Sarah went through the prospectus, she’d chosen an Introduction to Law National Certificate which thankfully turned out to be just what she was looking for. That course was swiftly followed by a HND in Legal Services, leading to advanced entry straight into third year at Robert Gordons University in Aberdeen to study Law and Management, two years later graduating with a 2:1 BA Hons degree.

During the degree course there was a requirement to complete a summer placement, Sarah took the bull by the horns and decided to make the most of the opportunity. “The university had an exchange program with a Canadian university so I was lucky enough to spend my placement on Prince Edward Island in Canada, working in the Department of Transportation and Public Works.”

“It wasn’t the most glamorous of jobs, one of my regular duties was to check fuel levels with a dipstick to make fuel orders – they also had me doing loudspeaker announcements, but each department had to send someone to see me to check what I’d said as no one could understand my accent, apparently as a Scot I roll my R’s! Alongside those tasks I did research projects and got to run my first tender, a blind bidding process, and found I quite enjoyed it.”

After finishing university many of Sarah’s cohort found jobs at the firms where they had completed their placements but, thanks to the geography challenges, Sarah found this wasn’t an option for her. ?“I did look at graduate schemes, but I’d realised I wanted to travel first so I made the decision to get temp work to get some office experience and earn money to pay for travelling.” Sarah joined the personal logistics department of a service provider within the oil and gas industry for a month on a set project. After week one she’d finished the work she’d been tasked with, so they found other tasks for her to do. After the month Sarah was offered a role as Personal Logistics Coordinator where she stayed for just over a year whilst saving.

With enough money in her pocket Sarah joined an overland tour company to travel for three months through Africa – from Nairobi to Cape Town, including trekking with mountain gorillas, and travelling through 10 countries. “It was a fantastic trip and I made memories to last a lifetime!”

When Sarah returned home she tried to get a job using her degree, but there was a new suite of graduates to compete with: “The only experience I had was crewing so I found work as a Personal Logistics Coordinator for a company which specialised in Diving, ROV, and Survey services. I stayed in that position for two years before they had a lull in their crewing dept which coincided with their commercial team being very busy. I was offered the chance to move into that team as it aligned with my degree. I thrived, staying for six years, and was fortunate enough to have three very strong characters to mentor me: I learnt a huge amount!”

From there Sarah moved to another subsea services firm where she started as Proposals Leader before moving to Senior Proposals Leader, then Proposals and Estimating Lead.

“After that I went to DeepOcean Subsea Cables where I first encountered Enshore and Will Stephenson. I had been seconded to Enshore to tender a project and really enjoyed working with the team.” ?

After a short spell at another subsea firm, Sarah joined Enshore Subsea in February 2022 as Tender Manager. “What’s the best part of my job? I enjoy it all! If I could go back in time and give career advice to 16-year-old Sarah I’d say don’t be afraid to follow your dreams, but don’t be surprised if they change along the way. I also got some great advice from a good friend and ex-colleague that helps me when facing new challenges – always have confidence in yourself, and the world will have confidence in you!”

To mark National Careers Week Enshore Subsea is pleased to open registrations of interest for our Summer Internship Programme 2024. ?????????? ??????, ?????? ?????? ???????? ???????????? ??????????????????????, ???? ?????????????? ????????????????????!??At Enshore Subsea you can grow and develop your career alongside the trusted delivery experts in installing and protecting critical subsea infrastructure. Email [email protected] to register interest in the Summer Internship Programme.