This is Nikhil and I would like to share my exciting journey from being a rookie developer to leading the backend team at Appiness, a leading web development company in Bangalore.
Learning to program is hard. It's difficult to know where to start, but it's even more challenging to know what to do after you've learned the basics. A person needs to be at the right organization to kickstart his/her professional career as it determines your career trajectory. Early in your career, you need to master your craft. You need a job that will permit you to do that, expose you to a lot of different things, and provide mentoring from someone who has been there before. And yes, I was at the right place at the right time!
Initial months...
With a few months of experience in PHP, I came into "Appiness". I was getting used to the "organized chaos" in the whole office. The first thing that I learned here is that your job is not just about what you do, but also about whom you do it with. Having good colleagues with whom you can collaborate makes all the difference in the world. Surrounding myself with people who eat, sleep and think about technology was a major plus.
The big switch...
"Are you ready to take up a new challenge?" asked the CTO, to which the obvious answer was "Yes!". The company's plan to adopt new technologies and the nature of the upcoming projects were clearly explained. Then I started my journey with Python. The most important tip the CTO gave me is to make sure while learning, I "learn it the hard way". The management gave me adequate time to learn Python. The transition from PHP to Python was smooth and I enjoyed the process of learning. Soon I was allowed to be a part of the backend team of the biggest project in Appiness at that time. Identifying talents and giving them enough space to perform has always been Appiness's forte.
The h"Appy" life...
The flat hierarchy has certainly helped every person in the organization. The transparent work culture allows us to learn different stuff from not only people within our team but also from people in other teams as well. For example, if someone from the backend team wants to learn a frontend technology, they can easily seek guidance from the frontend team and vice versa. If they grasp the new technology well and want to continue working on it, there is always an option for that. This kind of flexibility helps the employees as well as the organization.
Mastering the skills and gaining confidence in the technology that you are working on is important not only for you but also for the company. Successful delivery of multiple projects is the result of it. With every project, I was gaining more knowledge about different concepts of programming and other technologies as well. The learning never ends. The freedom to learn new stuff and implement the same has always been there at Appiness.
After completing a few projects, a new challenge was given to me. Leading the backend team of a project was a new experience for me. I was now involved in the project's phases other than just development work. Interacting with other team members and providing vital inputs always helps the development team. Actively being part of both the project planning and the execution team is exciting. Having teammates with a goal-oriented mindset is a plus as it helps in the smooth execution of the project. Yes, there will always be ups and downs and in the case of something going wrong, we always try to catch it at the initial stage and rectify it rather than allowing it to grow and affect the goal. The management also always encourages us to find the root cause and solve it as soon as possible and not keep talking about things that are not going well as the latter does not benefit anyone involved in it.
After three and a half years working as a python developer, the company trusted me and gave me the opportunity to lead the backend team. Excited about the new role, and another opportunity to learn new skills, I always wanted to give my best towards it. I was very lucky to build an awesome team with people full of excitement and eagerness to learn. Finding simple solutions to complex problems with the team is the best part.
I always believe that the backend of any application is similar to a bicycle chain because only when the chain malfunctions we get to know how important it is for the entire functioning of the bicycle and maybe that is the only time we give attention to it. Similarly, no one notices the heavy lifting done by the backend of an application unless it breaks somewhere. That is why I am always happy when no one notices the presence of the backend in an application as that is the time when it works seamlessly. I believe after the client and the UX person, the backend engineers must know about the end-to-end functionality of the application. If they are not able to visualize the entire project, the chances of it failing as a whole is much higher.
Life at Appiness is not just about work and work though. The two-month-long "Appiness Premier League" is one attractive thing which most of the employees wait for. A mini Olympics which started as a fun thing to ease out the workload, if any. But things started to get serious as years passed by, where people started to train themselves months before the league started to perform well at the games. I felt that the productivity was better in these months as most of them try to finish their work as soon as possible so that they get enough time to prepare for the games. The intense but fun games are followed by an anniversary party. We also have regular team outings which improve the bonding within the team.
Thanks to each and everyone in Appiness for the encouragement and support given to me in these 5 years. I am sure that Appiness will keep improving, growing, and build more and more awesome products in the coming years.
Appiness is recognized as the leading web development company in Bangalore, providing feature-rich web services that support augmenting the customer base. Our experienced web developer builds professional websites using technologies such as Python, NodeJS, AngularJS, Laravel PHP framework, Bootstrap, and many more.
