A LEAP apprentice's experience: Part 1 - Classroom Training

In this article series, I will be exploring my time in the Microsoft LEAP Apprenticeship program. This article will go in-depth of the 3-week classroom training that I went through.?

The Microsoft LEAP apprenticeship program consists of a 3-week classroom training and 13-week project period program that totals to a 16-week apprenticeship program. From what I have heard, the LEAP program will be expanding the 3-week classroom training to 4 weeks which means the project will be 12-week project period.

My cohort was fully virtual which meant all instruction and work was done remotely. At the time of this writing, the cohorts continue to be virtual. Whether or not this pattern continues is an unknown like the COVID pandemic.

Now for the disclaimers: Every apprentice's experience is different and this article is based off my personal experience being a part of the cohort 25 so take note that my opinions are my own and what you hear here is just 1 person's opinion. As the program continues to evolve, the content written here may become irrelevant. I highly encourage you to reach out to other apprentices/graduates to hear about their experience and keep yourself up to date by looking up the program's official website.

The Classroom Training

The first day of the LEAP program was a bundle of nerves. The cohort consisted of roughly 40 Software Engineers and 5 TPMs and you could feel the excitement and anxiety in the Microsoft Teams room. Introductions were made, instructors promptly introduced LEAP and Microsoft, icebreaker games were had. The one thing that we all learned on that very first day was the LinkedIn Learning course on overcoming impostor syndrome and we were told that over 1000 applicants had applied to the cohort. That meant it was a ~5% acceptance rate. That was a powerful statement to let the apprentices know we belonged here. The learning and work we would undergo would be enlightening and beneficial to Microsoft and their customers so it was impertinent to feel we did belong.

Over the course of the 3 weeks, we had almost daily LinkedIn Learning courses covering communication, teamwork skills, listening, Agile, OOP and many more. We also had a lab group where we were split into teams of 4 or 5 and projects were given to simulate working in a team and practice Agile, C#, OOP etc. together. For future apprentices, I recommend that you focus on working well with your team rather than focusing on completing the assignments. The purpose of these projects are meant to be a simulation and your individual performance is not graded so figure out what works best for your team. Finding the rhythm or workflow that is most conducive for your team will reap benefits in your projects. This is also a great time for you to experience workplace conflicts and resolving them. If you have an different opinion on how to design this console app game, what should you do? Better yet, what can you do better in retrospect??

These assignments are then reviewed by Microsoft professions(SWEs/PMs) and the feedback given will help you improve to become a better SWE/PM. Personally, I learned a lot about OOP and design architecture from these reviews. Also, shoutout to my team, they were amazing (Go #PySharp!), and I had a wonderful experience working each and every one of them.?

Conclusion

The 3 week classroom was all too short and I wished I had more time with the cohort my fellow lab group. I want to thank the instructors and administration for putting together this wonderful classroom experience. I had a blast and I wish I could do it all over again.