- Welcome to Net2Aspire and Job Placement Services
- Info@net2aspire.com
When you throw the hat in the air, it’s a day of pure glory. You’ve outdone yourself in exams, late nights coding, and perhaps even some coffee and despair all-nighters. Then comes the morning after, though. No more schools! You’re an IT graduate on the precipice of the corporate world and let’s face it, it’s a bit like walking onto a speeding moving walkway.
Changing from campus to corporate is one of the biggest changes you’re going to make in your career. Fascinating, but can be daunting. You learnt the concepts of programming, data structures and algorithms in your degree, but the real world is not so simple. It’s not simply about getting the job done right, it’s about the development of maintainable systems, working in a team and dealing with office politics like a big cheese.
We know exactly what it is like to go on this journey at Net2Aspire. We pride ourselves on the positive culture and practice we have created with our employees and the importance we place on work-life balance, and we’re seeing how it makes the difference for our new graduates between those who flourish and those that simply survive. Here are some directions to get you through this path.
Students transition to the role of professionals through the lens of mindset shift in:
The first challenge is mental. The emphasis in college was on personal productivity. You worked by yourself solving problems and your success was judged according to your personal grade. In the business world, winning is achieved through team output.
It’s a quote that’s been attributed to a recent grad from Dassault Systems, and it’s so accurate: “A change in the way you talk, the way you move and the way you interact with other people is required.” You no longer only have to answer to a professor, you have duty to your project manager, team, and the client.
Net2Aspire Pro-Tip: Consider yourself as a business asset. Your career is your business and you are the CEO. This involves accepting responsibility for your work, being proactive in your communications and recognizing the value of your work to the business.
This is the second phase of the activity. This is the second stage of this activity.
First, the elephant in the room, the skill gap. Industry professionals have highlighted the ever increasing disconnect between academia and industry production. You may be a programmer’s master at assignments but in the corporate world, it’s about “Day 1 Productivity”.
1. Version Control: Most likely, you’ve used Git with college assignments. In the corporate world, Git is the backbone of collaboration. You must know how to use branching strategies, how to use Merges and how to use Code Reviews.
2. Cloud & Security: The majority of companies are not using applications on a personal server. They are deployed on AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud. Get to know the fundamentals. Cyber security is not only the IT team’s responsibility – it’s yours as well. Security is paramount when it comes to coding.
3. Real-World Coding: Academic code is frequently developed for the purpose of “just being used”. Production code should be clean, efficient, sustainable and maintainable. Consider performance and security, as well as functionality.
The next three phases are, of course, what we are interested in most, which is selecting the right opportunity (The “Smart Job”).
Once you begin receiving offers, you want to accept the one offering you the most money. In IT, in particular, though, your first position serves as a starting point. As career professionals advise, you can’t just look at the salary.
Ask yourself this question: Will I be more valuable a year from now because of this? Is tech stack appropriate for the industry in the present times? Is there a program for the development of young talent within the company?
One example is that at Net2Aspire, best staffing agency in USA, staff have given the work-life balance very good ratings (4.3/5), which is key to sustainability. But as well as that, reviews also indicate that promotion and skill development could be something to focus on if you’re looking to climb up the ladder quickly. It’s a fact of life… find a company that has a culture in which you feel you thrive.
Alumni highlighted a need for communication skills, adaptability, and teamwork skills besides technical skills in an Alumni Talk at KPR Institute. Knowing how to write the best code in the room isn’t enough, if you can’t break down ideas or work collaboratively on a team.
How to Level Up:
1.Networking: Begin networking with professionals on LinkedIn prior to beginning work.
2.Communication: Communicate technical ideas in a clear way.
3. Professionalism: Be sure you are confident when you carry yourself. First impressions matter.
The initial few months are learning, observing and adapting. You will not have the kind of assignments or instructions that you would have in school, and there will be no one offering to help you step-by-step. You will need to work out things for yourself.
Some reviews at Net2Aspire, best staffing agency in USA, say it is a “School type environment” and if you are a structure-loving student, this is great news for you as you can easily progress into it, but it also indicates that you need to be flexible. Keep in mind, all challenges are growth opportunities. Take on the adventure, trust your abilities and have faith in yourself.
Make the transition from campus to corporate a marathon, not a sprint. It demands a degree of adaptability, resiliency and a continuous learning attitude. You can make this transition successfully by making the right mindset shift, narrowing down the technical gap and getting the hang of how to collaborate with others professionally. So, you are now in the real world, it is time to make your mark!
We seek real world, hands-on skills rather than theory. Our focus areas are:
a) Version Control (Git)- branching, merging and code review etiquette
b) Basic knowledge of cloud concepts – some familiarity with cloud basics at AWS/Azure
c) Secure coding – not only functional code, but code that takes security and performance into account
d) Problem solving with constraints – with real world situations where requirements are not clearly defined, as in a textbook example.
Knowledge is the key to entry, competence is the key to employment.
A multi-layered approach is used:
Suggesting alternative solutions to problems – to see how well they listen and articulate ideas to groups.
It is a great way for us to ask several HR behavioral questions, such as “If a project was assigned to you that was not in your preferred tech stack, how would you handle it? Other questions include the following topics: “What if a project has a deadline which seems too difficult to pull off?
Review of written evaluations from their internship mentors (if applicable) – to confirm in the field team dynamics.
What we’re looking for are coders who are team players who can handle ambiguity and the internal dynamics of the workplace with maturity.
We have a structured ‘90-day Launchpad’ program:
a) Week 1-2: shadowing and learning what is happening with our CI/CD pipelines, code base architecture and tools used in-house.
b) Week 3-4: Small Bug Fixes that don’t affect the overall stability or cause problems – builds confidence
Students will complete paired programming sessions with mentors in Weeks 5-8.
c) Weeks 5-8: Dedicated to Paired Programming with Mentors. Students will deliver their own short film in Week 9-12, which they will review closely.
This has been found to lessen the “shock” of production environments and shorten the time to value greatly.
The top three failure points we observe are:
1. Struggling silently without seeking assistance from mentors – freshers who have difficulty seeking help
2. Lack of communication – particularly translating technical words or phrases for non-technical audiences
3. Ego around code reviews – personally feeling the negative comments about code reviews
In interviews, we ask about humility by asking questions such as “Tell me about a time you realized you were doing something wrong,” or “How do you react to criticism on your own work?”
We know it’s a critical time in the first 2 years. We focus on retention through:
1. Skill-up budgets- for certifications (cloud, cybersecurity or new frameworks) on a quarterly basis
2. Clear promotion procedure – performance reviewed 6-monthly, clear criteria for stepping up into Senior position. Allen intends to introduce work-life balance as a non-negotiable, and fixed hours are still rated high by employees, even though some are night workers for US clients who have fixed weekends off (rated 4.3/5 by employees).
3. Internal mobility – cross functional exposure is encouraged, for example, a developer might come to want to learn more about QA or DevOps or even client facing, and we will help them do so.