MY CAREER JOURNEY ALONG A LESS TRAVELLED PATH

Though different subjects whirled in my head whilst thinking about writing a new article, one subject which chimed my thoughts time and again, was to share my career experiences and the lessons I have learnt from them.

In these tough times, where corona is ruling the world and causing a sharp deterioration in world economies, leading to job losses and income falls, I could not think of a better subject than this. I hope this article will inspire and help the community in some way or other in this arduous time. 

My career journey was very much an amalgamation of positive and difficult experiences. I am more thankful for the tough experiences because the myriad of positive ways those experiences contributed to my career growth is inconceivable. Though this was not an easy journey, it was enlightening and joyful which I will cherish in my heart forever.

FROM CHILDHOOD TO UNIVERSITY

I have been very fortunate to be born and raised in a beautiful state ‘Kerala’ in India and under circumstances where nature kind of encompasses a lot into one’s upbringing and growing.

The very first time I encountered computers as a subject I always dreamt of being in the field of IT. With that interest and zeal in mind, I decided to pursue my education in order to achieve my dreams. I completed my schooling in Kerala and then I moved onto Tamil Nadu to complete my Engineering degree in Information Technology.

Probably by fortune, fate, or destiny however you may look at it, something landed me here in the UK in December 2006. A month and a year that everything in me started to provide a completely different viewpoint to life.

I landed in the UK with nothing but nervousness to face a new world and a new life - with language constraints, culture shock, lack of experience in the field of IT and many other factors. But the golden words from my parents 'Be humble, Listen and Learn' boosted my confidence and I was ready to seize and enjoy all my new experiences.

MY CAREER JOURNEY

Generally, when we start a journey, say from point A to point B, we always a have a plan and we think that once we deviate from the plan it may not work. There is always lot of confusion and not many of us choose to go through it. Yes, it is a risk. But what doesn’t have a risk in life? In my career, I had a journey that had a lot of deviations. 

My first job in the UK was with 'Cancer Research UK', the charity firm which changed my life. This meant everything to me. I worked as an Assistant Manager (Volunteer - 5 days a week) and helped the firm in the best possible way I could: to bring a smile to every customer I met. In parallel, I was trying to find a job in the field of IT.

In Sept 2007, I got the first entry into a technical job as a Graduate software developer for an organisation named Civica, based in Leeds. When I was working as a software developer, I got an opportunity to explore the field of software testing, which was a bit of a diversion, but still wanted to try it. I then continued to work as a Software Tester in many organisations like Proactis(EGS), Springer Nature, IBM, SAP Concur, O2 in various roles like Senior Tester, Automation Tester, Test Lead and Test Manager. 

At my previous organisation, LexisNexis, I started as a Senior QA, got promoted as Consulting QA and then moved on to become a Software Engineering Manager.

In a few of these organisations, I got to work with Thought Works consultants, and this provided me an excellent avenue to learn and understand more about agile. From then on, I have been helping organisations to adopt agile best practices.

I have always been keen to explore different domains and new companies. This might look crazy to some of you and honestly for myself too at times. But this craziness gave me wonderful opportunities to work in various departments like Development, QA and in Management and also for amazing companies.

Though at times, I questioned myself wondering if I made the right decision of moving away from pure techy roles. Having received various accolades including the finalist for Computing women in IT excellence awards Role model of the year in IT motivated me and made me realise that it was the right decision and encouraged me to do more and more.

I have been here in the UK for 13 years with lots of twists and turns and diversions in my career, but I am, absolutely happy and grateful to all the organisations I worked for and most importantly, the amazing individuals from those organisations.

In 2020 here I am as a Scrum Master/Team Manager working for an incredible organisation-IRIS Software Group.

Apart from helping IRIS with our agile transformation, I am also helping the external agile communities by giving lightning talks and presenting in their meetup events. Sharing is caring!

HOW DID I DEAL WITH THE KEY CHALLENGES I FACED?

There are quite a lot of challenges I faced in my career journey especially with the mindset of some of the people, building trust and dealing with difficult conversations. But over the years I have learnt about how to deal with it.

1. Different mindset for different people:

Quite often we expect people to behave like us. But remember, not everyone is alike. Try to understand others, help and coach them. If the mistake is at your end, be gracious to accept it and most importantly try to learn from it.

2. Building Trust:

This is another factor which is a challenge when you move to a new organisation. We all jump to earn trust from others. But remember to give trust first, before you attempt to earn it back from others. Be patient, it takes time .

3. Difficult Conversations:

None of us like tough or difficult conversations. While I climbed the ladder to leadership, I was also the same. But my experiences taught me to deal with it. Never try to escape from difficult people or difficult conversations. Be bold and face it, but to do so with empathy.

MY PRINCIPLES

As we spend more time at work than at home, it is very essential for us to be happy at our workplace and also share a great bond and rapport with our colleagues. There are certain principles which I followed in my career and they are indispensable in my journey.

1. Teamwork
2. Trust
3. Respect
4. Humility
5. Agility

Teamwork:

I always believed the organisation we work for is our team and the team we work with daily is a sub team part of that overall team. That is when we never disengage from the organisation that we work for. We work with our organisation as a team.

I have noticed many times competition between teams in an organisation. The only way an organisation can succeed is when we realise, we are 'One Team'.

Always remember in a journey there will be ups and downs and remember it is ok to make mistakes. All you need to do is accept it, correct it and learn from it

Trust:

I strongly believe Trust starts within you and then the path you have taken and then towards the members of the working space you are involved in. Do not doubt yourself.

Because if you doubt yourself you create a shell of doubt and then you spread that energy and may lose the leader within you.

Respect:

Like trust, Respect starts with you. Respect yourself, respect your thoughts and decisions that you have taken.

Only when you respect yourself, it becomes mutual and when it becomes mutual you will try to understand others' opinions and their decisions and not judge them.

Humility:

One of the key factors of my leadership style is to be humble. This one factor in me which I cherish and will take forward with me irrespective of roles or the designations.

I was very lucky that most of the managers I worked with were always humble, approachable and they were offering me help at any time. This along with my career journey always helped me to stay grounded irrespective of my role or title.

Agility:

My experience of working with number of companies and individuals of different nature and skillset naturally helped me cross the boundaries and be more agile in terms of my thinking and work culture

BIGGEST LESSON I LEARNT IN LIFE

The biggest lesson I've learnt during my career journey is ‘Courage is doing what you are afraid to do'.

Quite often, we do not take up challenges because of the fear of failure of making mistakes or thinking about how people will judge us.

In the initial part of my career, I was very nervous to try out new things and did not believe in myself. I was afraid to speak about my feelings and felt hopeless and ended up just performing mundane tasks given to me.

All that changed when I started to get involved in tasks that I was not familiar with. I began to realise it's fine to make mistakes, to be more vocal in communication and to be visible in the organisation. The assistance and support I received from some of my managers and mentors were astonishing when I gathered the courage to speak out and collaborate with them.

Being courageous made me learn that it is perfectly OK to not know everything. You may make mistakes in the beginning, which is perfectly fine, but the key aspect is to learn from those mistakes and develop yourself.

The only way I could gain courage was to get involved in the tasks that I was not familiar with.

Conclusion

I had a journey that had lot of deviations, transitioning from one role to another.  And yes, it was a risky journey and no, I was not unhappy. Today all those risks, twists and turns that I decided to take have only made me happy, peaceful, and satisfied.

Being in the busy IT life with back to back meetings, overwhelming schedule and exhausting conversations can drain our energy and it is quite natural to lose the empathy and soft skills in us. But the golden words from my parents 'Be humble, Listen and Learn' continues to chant in my ears and that mantra will be used throughout my life to stay positive, be happy and to spread that energy to others.

I would like to sum up and end this article with a quote from one of the role models in my life, Dr. A.P.J Abdul Kalam, Indian scientist and politician who was the President of India from 2002 to 2007.

In life no one will remember you the way you looked, walked or talked or what you did...

Everyone just remembers you by the way you made them feel when they were with you