How my 22 month developer experience at Amdocs shaped my career?
From a graduate engineer to an Innovation Agent! 🙌
Amdocs, for me, is synonymous with the first job offer, first paycheck, first bonus, and first promotion. The list doesn’t end here. I had the opportunity to work with the best team, caring managers, helpful teammates, and knowledgeable experts.
But it’s almost time to say goodbye after an amazing stint of two years. So, here I am penning down my personal experience in my own words with Amdocs and how it helped me to shape my B-school journey.🕴
Amdocs will always be my happy place as it moulded my perspective of a 9–5 job into a myriad of opportunities to ace each day!
Read my article till the end to know my journey from being an intimidated graduate associate to an experienced developer and Innovation Agent.
Onboarding and Training 👩💻
I still remember my first day, which was 30th July 2020. We had our first call with the direct managers assigned to us beforehand. They were friendly and, at the same time, professional. They have an experience of 12+ years, but we got advised to call everyone in the company by their first name regardless of their hierarchy. And that minute, I bet everyone was a bit relaxed and more open!
After successful onboarding, we got assigned a buddy mentor to reach out to in case of any questions. A few days later, our training program began with the learning experts.
We were divided into a group of maybe 20 and had learning sessions on various tools and technologies used by Amdocs in their core projects. Apart from it, we also trained on some specific domains according to the projects we would be working on.
This decision of who goes to which project was made by our managers. Those initial 2–3 months felt like a revisit to college due to the training sessions all day long, but now with salary credited!
First Project! 🚀
So, around November 2020, my first project was assigned to me. It was a core R&D project called Real-Time Billing. At that time, the project was in its early development stages.
Despite being just a CS graduate software associates at that time, we were highly welcomed and helped in each step of our daily work. From feature development to the user story demo, I am still very thankful to my helpful teammates and seniors, who had the patience to explain and clear my doubts, however silly it was!
Fast forward, the whole year passed by, and I developed and contributed to many crucial features and NFT developments on my way. I learned several things that were not present in my college degree.
Innovation Journey 💡
It all started when I participated in the Innovation Fair for freshly graduated people who joined Amdocs. The program had entries from nearly 400+ software associates who joined Amdocs that year.
I also submitted my entry for my university end-semester project Face Mask Detection. The program was well-structured, with one-to-one mentoring and pitch practice sessions scheduled. I had the golden opportunity to interact with Rajat Raheja, Amdocs India Division President — a moment I will cherish for a lifetime!
With time I participated and ended up being on the leaderboard for a few innovation programs.
With each event passing by, I could feel my enthusiasm and sense of empathy getting developed. It helped me network with the right like-minded people, on and off work.
Many recognised and congratulated me on LinkedIn. Even I got a special bonus from my manager for my exemplary innovation skills in the events and in my regular project! Isn’t that cool?
Delivery Team — Bell Canada 🇨🇦
As time passes, so does your team and work! On the contrary, I embraced this change and buckled up for the new challenges. In October 2021, I moved to the Digital Delivery team of Bell Canada.
My work hours were stretched, with more things to learn and a few to teach others! The work was different from R&D, but it was more exciting. Here I had the opportunity to work and learn from the best Scrum Master and mentor, Ankit.
His guidance and work ethic are something to look forward to it. We handled many low days with a smile only because of our lead, Ankit. The way he micromanages a team is what anyone should aspire to become!
In this project, I had less time to indulge in activities apart from my regular work. Still, my manager encouraged me to participate in innovation events and focus groups.
Around this time, I got my second bonus, Star of the Month mention, and an amazing job progression — Yes! A promotion! 😍
Innovation Agent with least industry experience! 😱
Having participated in several innovation events, I gave my shot at the Amdocs India Innovation Agents 3.0 Program. This program selects 15 Innovation Agents across Amdocs India who will be responsible for imparting the knowledge of Design Thinking to their fellow employees. They would also act as key people who would help the Innovation Team structure and organise the various Amdocs Innovation events across the globe.
I went through 2 rounds of interviews. My only objective was to be confident in what I was doing then and what to expect in future. I wanted to change the perspective of company-wide innovation events for GenZ employees.
Much to my surprise, I got selected as one of the Innovation Agents. My joy knew no bounds when I found out that I had the least number of years of experience to be on the list!
We went through six weeks of an internal certification program in Effective Facilitation and Design Thinking. I got an opportunity to learn with the best creative folks and industry experts and also made effective use of Canva for the slide deck! 😁
Blog, Dance, Art, Books, Quiz… 🎯
Amdocs taught me to work apart from work! Every day we have something or the other to keep us engaged. From meditation and yoga sessions to vocal singing, just name it!
As I have a passion for blogging, art, and dancing, I participated in various events like Amdocs Got Talent, Read-a-Logue, fundraising Mentee quizzes, etc., along with my family.
And Amdocs being such a caring employer, sent me a bunch of goodies every time. I’m still awaiting a few more goodies! 💜
Adios, Amdocs! 👋
Nonetheless, I had to say goodbye to my dreamy job and pursue my higher studies. It was an extreme honor to work, laugh, learn, and admire the amazing people here during my short work tenure.
I will miss each and every one of you. Hope to cross our paths again someday!
Till then, Adios Amdocs!
You all will always #MakeItAmazing ❤️
