- August, 2020
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You are young, smart, and ambitious. You’re finishing or finished your studies and now you’re looking for an experience. What to do? Where to start? Whom to approach?
You either already experienced mentioned situation or you are going to face it. Here’s one tip for you: enjoy.ing organizes various internship programs for young software engineer offering them experience in .NET, QA, Java, JavaScript and even more.
Here is a story about one of them.
Why is internship helpful?
Internship is a crucial step for anyone pursuing career advancements in the field of software development. Story by my internship fellows and my story confirms that.
Even though I have a degree in this field, I didn’t know a lot about real work. I suppose many people face the same challenge. Because of that, enjoy.ing internship program is an excellent way for young professionals to learn about what to expect.
During this program, I gained better insight into the dynamics of the industry – how external factors can influence daily routines and the importance of flexibility and being able to adapt.
Accepting the offer.
I’ve heard about enjoy.ing a few years ago, when my dear friend Aleksa, a member of the enjoy.ing team, embarked upon a journey similar to mine.
A pleasant working atmosphere, enabled by the company employees and the excellent knowledge share system, which was in development for years by experts in various fields all contributed to my experience with enjoy.ing. Even though, I’ve never worked there, I’ve already had great impression about company.
I had also learned about the company through social media and, given my excitement, I had decided to become a member of the team. During the entire process, my decision to join them has only more and more solidified as a sound one.
About enjoy.ing internship program and company in general, you can be informed in many ways – Facebook, enjoy.ing website, LinkedIn.
Internship in 12 Weeks.
Day 1/90 – Getting to know the interns and employees has made the process much easier. When I had gotten to know the mentors that were there for us from the first until the last day, I realized just how crucial it is to build a good working atmosphere and that everyone enjoys what they are doing. This helped alleviate the awkwardness present whenever you start doing something new.
During the next couple of weeks, we worked with mentors who have more than 15 years of experience in software engineering (Predrag Vlatković, Zoran Siljanovski, Goran Simić – thanks a lot for sharing tips and tricks with us) through the workshops in order to solidify the knowledge gained and we were introduced to new things that were going to be the focus of the following period.
An important part of the learning process is the experience that these people have accumulated, as well as advice about what approach to learning is best suited to certain clients and situations – this is something that we just could not know before.
Day 30/90 – The workflow of projects and how they are organized was not something I knew a lot about before the internship. I would single out working on an internal project slated for production as the most important part of the internship.
We were acquainted with how work on a certain project is organized and the importance of communication and knowledge sharing. We had learned to organize our time, among many other things. We developed our own programming skills, learning how to write code that can later be read and upgraded, we were familiarized with patterns that make software development easier and technologies that we would not be able to come into contact with outside of the internship, which is one of the points of the entire process.
Working on a project from the ground up is really an excellent experience through which one not only develops programming-related skills, but interpersonal skills such as communication, teamwork and constructive problem-solving. Cheers to our HR team who were always there for our dilemmas and problems.
Day 60/90 – When we talk about accepting change, being innovative and dynamic in this field, we only superficially knew what that was about before the internship. The emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic was a true test of such skills.
That is when we truly learned how quickly things can change in this industry. We saw that in our older peers when they changed clients and introduced new technologies. Our team as well had more responsibilities related to team organization, communication and goal-tracking.
Working at home ushered in great changes. It was an excellent experience but also a crueler example of just how much this field is dynamic. This is when our abilities to organize our work and to accept change were put to the test.
The impact of the situation varies individually. Some people enjoyed working from home more than others but, personally, I believe that it can be very productive if we are well-organized.
The end.
The team worked as per the guidelines from the mentors and the HR department which was concurrently a part of the Product Owner team. During the internship, we were occasionally given valuable feedback and precise guidance on how to improve our skills. In the end, our mentors presented their own impressions of working with us and a report of our advancements.
The end of the internal project and transitioning to more concrete projects is something that we were all waiting for. Even though our group did not change much, our surroundings did, which presented a whole new set of adventures through which we will learn and develop.
I want to mention that the company overcame all disadvantages of the market and offered everyone to climb the ladder.
At the end of the process, I can say with confidence that I’ve learned a lot more than I expected in the field of programming and technology, aside from shaping my preexisting knowledge and developing personal traits crucial to further advancements, that I had already mentioned.
Throwback.
Looking back, I would single out the following points as crucial to the success of this process.
- Communication and interpersonal relationships – one of the reasons why you will truly love this job and stay motivated in key moments.
- Experience and knowledge shared through the “knowledge share” system which is continually being developed – development of new and existing programming skills as well as advice from peers that is shared selflessly.
- Asking questions – a very important trait that we gained. Pertains to both learning and further work endeavors.
- Adapting to and being aware of the latest trends – this is crucial for long-term development.
- Expressing one’s own opinion – enjoy.ing appreciates openness and developing this trait has a big impact on further endeavors.
- A chance to work on meaningful projects – an opportunity to gauge our own knowledge and to utilize acquired knowledge.
- Mentorship – the last, but definitely not the least important point. The first steps in this field are made easier by these people. I am very glad that my starting point was in this place.
After everything above, as well as the offer extended to me after the internship to utilize the latest technologies and to get to know a new team of excellent professionals which will continue to guide and teach us, I have decided to join the enjoy.ing team and to continue my career with them.
Less important.
My name is Miloš Prolić.
As I love to learn new things and do not like to box myself into a very specific field, the IT industry was alluring to me from an early age as it is a perfect opportunity to learn and grow and is definitely a field in which everyone can flourish in a certain way.
I would recommend the internship to everyone who is just beginning their career and want to discover what they truly are interested in. I would say that an internship program is a crucial starting point in every facet of the IT industry.
Author: Miloš Prolić, Software Engineer at enjoy.ing