Humans of Engineering - Nikolai's Story

This article is part of our Humans of?Engineering series,?a collection of stories shared by?our employees?to encourage, inspire, and connect with each other as around the world, companies transitioned to work from home.?The series was created by our WIT team based on?the popular?Humans of New York?blog.??

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Even though I have worked at LinkedIn for almost 10 years, you would never know that it took me even longer than that just to get my foot in the door.

In the beginning of my career, it was challenging to be noticed by the Silicon Valley giants. I had just completed a degree in computer science from Brooklyn College, but to my dismay, big tech companies were not heavily recruiting from the City University of New York (CUNY) schools — these schools did not hold the same weight as Ivy League Institutions. Even though I managed to get a good job at a bank in New York and continued to find other opportunities throughout my career, it was disappointing that I was constantly overlooked due to my alma mater.

After 10 years of experience and a graduate degree from New York University, Silicon Valley finally started to notice me. In early 2012, a recruiter from LinkedIn reached out to me through InMail and asked me to interview for their brand new New York office. I ultimately joined LinkedIn because of its mission to give economic opportunity to the global workforce — more specifically, to CUNY students. I saw this job as an opportunity to help out students and jumpstart their careers. In the first few years of my employment at LinkedIn, I attended several networking events as a company liaison and the recruiters started to notice.

In 2016, the site director of LinkedIn NYC asked me to participate in the Tech Talent Pipeline. The TTP was a NYC Small Business Services initiative that aimed to connect professionals from the tech industry with CUNY students and fill open positions in the city. As a CUNY graduate, I was more than thrilled; it was a nice change of pace to shift the hiring focus from top-tier east coast institutions. This program was an “official” avenue to continue my work with the CUNYs, and I even met with several deans of computer science programs to plead my case. After recognizing the enormous potential of this program, I made it my mission to find more opportunities to work with the CUNY schools.

A few years later, I found myself fulfilling part of my lifelong dream of becoming a professor. I joined the NYC Tech-in-Residence Corps program as an adjunct professor and taught three semesters of courses at City College about topics in modern software engineering. All the while, my manager at LinkedIn was extremely supportive and gave me time to grade assignments, come up with curriculum ideas, commute to the university, and more - this was all considered part of my job. I was able to represent LinkedIn externally and help future colleagues realize their potential, and that was invaluable to me.

During my teaching tenure, I was able to get to know many of my students on a deeper level. I saw their potential and was eager to help them land roles at the larger tech companies - I didn’t want them to have to wait 10 years like I did. I referred one of my students for a LinkedIn internship and he still works here full time; I connected a prospective data scientist with an industry professional and she now works at Spotify. It felt really gratifying to build networks for these bright students who may have otherwise been overlooked - I can’t imagine what my career would have looked like had I had a professional advocate like this.?

Shortly after the Tech-in-Residence Corps program, I forged a connection between LinkedIn and an organization called Break Through Tech (formerly WiTNY). We set up a short term winter-break internship for a cohort of three early career students from CUNYs, paying them significantly more than the required minimum wage. This was huge, since many CUNY students worked full time to provide for their families. With the help of LinkedIn WIT NYC, this program still exists today with cohorts three times as large. After getting this program off the ground, I continued to work with other local organizations like Brooklyn’s Marcy Lab School, which helps underemployed CUNY graduates get hands-on experience.?

If you think it sounds like I do a lot of work on top of my demanding engineering job, you’re right — I definitely do. But I wouldn’t trade it for anything. Doing this work is delivering on LinkedIn’s mission, but it’s also personal for me. Because of the CUNY schools, I got an education and a degree that accelerated my economic prosperity. It’s my turn to make sure that others have the same opportunities, and this is the most direct way that I can do it. But there are lighter ways to help out. Within your company, you can join an employee resource group; you can join outside organizations like Break Through Tech. No matter how big or small your contributions, every bit counts.

--?Nikolai Avteniev, Senior Staff Software Engineer [as told to?Sarah Denenberg]

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