Purpose: This article reports on a study that explored how individual factors, such as students' participatory actions and agentic factors, interact with the workplace contextual factors to create workplace learning environments that facilitate or hinder student learning. Design/methodology/approach: The study followed a qualitative approach. It collected data from 34 work placement students using interviews. The students were studying for a diploma in mechanical engineering at a South African university of technology. The data were analysed using thematic analysis. Findings: The study uncovered four themes relevant to the quality of work placement: the learning environment, student participation, collective agentic actions and the tasks performed. The study found that two learning environments are relevant for student learning: the potential learning environment and the experienced learning environment. It found that employability-enhancing activities and participation required that elements of the potential learning environment transfer to the experienced learning environment. It also found that the collective agency of the students and the industry mentors influences the transfer's effectiveness. Originality/value: This study elucidates the factors and mechanisms that affect the quality of the learning environment during a work placement. A better understanding of the factors and mechanisms that create employability-enhancing experienced learning environments would enable universities to develop more effective pre-placement programmes, better monitor work placement student progress and better support industry mentors.