From Support Engineer to Principal Architect... A journey at AWS to be thankful for.

This post was long overdue and with the recent lockdown I forced myself to spend some time to complete this. I wrote this post for 2 different reasons, 1. To share my story and build motivation to folks who are just entering the industry 2. To be thankful for all the support I have received for the last 8 years that has helped me grow not just in my career but also as a human being.

I joined AWS back in 2012, fresh out of the Masters program from Wichita State University. I had an offer letter in hand before completing my course and this felt like a dream. How this happened is still unknown. I till date don't know how I applied to AWS for a Cloud Support Engineer role but was happy to get that email from Kim Anderson who provided information about the role and set me up with an interview. After 2 rounds of phone interviews, I was invited to Seattle for an onsite interview. I should say, the onsite interview was thorough, detailed and of course, for a new grad like me was intimidating. But I did the best I could for the 5 hours at the AWS Blackfoot building which later became my office building. I wrapped up my interview and enjoyed the beautiful Seattle before heading home.

It was a sunday morning, I got an email from Kim about my offer acceptance. This was it, I was excited not just to have a job but to work for Amazon. I met Kim back in 2017 for a team offsite and couldn't be happier and went and said hi and introduced myself. To be honest, I didn't know anything about Cloud Computing at the time I accepted the offer, except for reading news articles. My background was focussed on Computer Networking.

They say it is always Day 1 at Amazon and I cant stress enough on this. I started my Day 1 in Seattle in June 2012 as a Cloud Support Engineer and joined the team with some amazing talent. We did not have a University program back in 2012. The folks who started with me came in with years of consulting experience or who were subject matter expertise in specific areas. This is where I felt intimidated and insecure, and had thoughts running over my mind. Did I even choose the right job for me? I didn't know even half of what they know. With all this things running inside my head, I started working and focussing on my day today work. My manager at that time was Muthu Natarajan. I cant say how grateful I am to have him as my first manager at AWS. Every 1:1 that I had with him was an energy booster for me to navigate this work environment. Without his support and guidance, it would have been nearly impossible for me to even survive in the role for few months. Till date, I know I can bounce back my ideas with him for any career decisions. Thankful to my roommate, college-mate and friend Jyothsna, we joined Amazon together and pushed each other always and had fun.

I met Daniel during my interview process. Daniel then turned to be my pseudo mentor. Without him, my sys admin skills would have stopped at just knowing cp or ls.. Daniel gave me projects to build, which instilled in me the early builder attitude we love at AWS.

It was July 2013, almost a year since I joined AWS, and by this time I was comfortable in my role and was helping customers solving complex networking cases. It was also this time we started to have focussed profile vs doing all cases. Due to personal reasons, I had to relocate to the bay area and had to leave the company with a heavy heart. It was hard but I did not have a choice. I joined a startup in the bay area focussing on VOIP, helping customers. One of AWS leadership principle is Think Big. And someone outside of AWS, who I admired was Nate Lee who was a classic example of someone who always raised the bar when it came to thinking big. He helped me learn not just the support aspect but the architecting and design decisions. The work at Fuze was fun but not challenging enough for me and it felt like I was doing repeated tasks everyday. I needed a change. I talked to Muthu about any roles at AWS that I could look into and soon things fell in place. I was able to rejoin AWS for s support role in the Bay Area. A huge thank you to Justin and Brent for trusting me and giving me this opportunity to come back in as a boomerang.

I joined back AWS in Apr 2014, it was Day 1 again. Within a year I got promoted to Technical Account Manager in Apr 2015. This role definitely made me step outside of my comfort zone, focus on broader AWS services, talk to C-level executives and help make business decisions for the companies I supported. I continued supporting strategic customers and again within a year got promoted to Senior Technical Account Manager. I cant stress enough of how much these folks have helped me grow in this role and progress in my career. Starting with Balmohan Singh, who I share a very close relationship as a friend and it is also funny how Ballu and I move into new roles at the same time and get promoted around the same time, Joe Hseih who was an inspiration to move into the TAM role, Ben Noble and Randy Will for all their support throughout my TAM career, Ching Ching Tan who continues to be someone I can lean on always, During my tenure as a TAM, I also developed relations with Matt Lehwess who taught me the importance of diving deep and Mark Stalzer who constantly pushed me to accept new responsibilities and own things and for being an amazing mentor.

In Aug 2016, I got introduced to a Solutions Architect role to help a partner build a new service on AWS. This was completely out of my forte but I decided to take the risk and make the switch. This role was life changing. It helped me build a product for AWS and VMware, explore a technology I had no idea about and provided an opportunity for me to work with some amazing talent both on the AWS and VMware side. There are many leaders who I admire, but there are very few technical leaders who I have worked with and one such person is Matt Yanchyshyn. I was lucky to work with him. He helped me take risks, helped me establish a brand name for myself, help me grow as a better public speaker and pushed me beyond what I thought I could do. From building and launching a product, to reviewing GTM strategy, to writing 6 pagers for product features to talking to customers and partners on adoption, this role has taught me a lot. I also learnt better about myself, my strengths and my weaknesses. One of the things I would like to call out is, prior to 2015 I haven't spoken at any AWS conference or industry conferences. I pushed myself to grow in this area and now for the past 4 years, I have been speaking at a number of AWS events, industry conferences etc. This took a lot of effort and wouldn't have happened if I didn't have support from my colleagues and family who would sit and patiently listen to my talk to give feedback. The impact of this project and my work had helped me get promoted in Apr 2019 to a Principal Architect, And for this I am thankful to my team, specially Wen Yu and Andy Reedy, who started on this project alongside me and held the fort strong at all times and pushed each other through ups and downs. A few more folks to be thankful for are Rima Olinger, who inspires me everyday, Steve Jones who is another great technical leader, Isaiah Weiner from whom I learnt how to make work as much fun as other things, Steve Seymour for being the best at what he does and also encouraging me every single time, Shreyak and Sunil for the all the time they spend listening to me and giving me candid feedback always. The list goes on..... All these years I have not only progressed my career, learnt new technologies but built relationships that will last a lifetime.

Lastly to everyone that I might have missed out, who have been there every step of my way and helping me grow as an Amazonian, thank you.

Some things I have learnt along the way:

1. Trust yourself and take risks. I love the regret minimization framework from Jeff. And it is also okay to fail.
2. Build your connections, have a mentor, and be a mentor to help others grow.
3. Do what you love. I am passionate about my role and helping customers build some amazing businesses on AWS.

To all my fellow new grads, If I can do it, so can you !!!