Why I interned at ThoughtWorks?

I found my passion early in life. My parents got me a laptop when I was young and I quickly picked up programming. Soon, along with my skills, my outlook changed too, I understood that software was really about humanity and helping people using computer technology. I liked the idea of building something from scratch and seeing it being used by millions of people.

I have been building softwares using open-source tools and thoroughly embracing the idea of "open-source software". When I came to ThoughtWorks, I realized that technical communities, here provide a supportive environment for developers working on open source initiatives. Wherever possible, ThoughtWorkers promote the use of open source software on development projects. They have worked on a lot of open-source technologies for the community like GoCD, Guage, Bahmni, CoyIM and CSS Critic just to name a few. I saw that my interests were in complete alignment with ThougthWorks’ goal and mission.

Interning here, I soon realized that the organization has been giving back a lot to the community. And I mean a lot! ThoughtWorkers host and organize technical events on a regular basis, to spread and share knowledge. The Chennai office in particular is very close to my home and I began actively participating a lot in their events. It soon became pretty obvious that I would end up working at ThoughtWorks, it was the perfect workplace for me!

Outside of ThoughtWorks, my interests had been evolving as I was learning. I used to indulge in a lot of work on back-end technologies and later began to work on data analysis. I combined my strong background in math and stats with programming which made things awesome and hacky. My interests gradually drew me into machine learning (ML) and data science.

Imagine my happiness when my interest in machine learning was met with an opportunity to work with the team at ThoughtWorks on an ML project? I was in techie heaven.

So, what do I find so compelling about ThoughtWorks?

The People

This is something many ThoughtWorkers will tell you, it’s the people we (yes, I consider myself an official, true-blue ThoughtWorker) get to interact with. Almost all are exceptional folks – smart, innovative and sincere. ThoughtWorkers are caring and well-meaning. Many are actually quite funny. Working with these people on a day-to-day basis has been quite a pleasure.

The Purpose

In many companies, the sole purpose of existence is adding business value and making shareholders happy. At ThoughtWorks, we have a greater purpose. When we say we want to change the world and make it a better place, we mean it.

As a firm, we invest our energy, our time and significant resources towards projects that serve social justice. ThoughtWorkers are likely to go above and beyond the call, for clients.

 Cutting Edge Technologies

We play with cutting edge innovation a lot of the time. We are thought-leaders in the agile arena and early adopters of Java, dotnet, Ruby and other dynamic languages such as Python. In simple words, we use each language for its purpose.

Pairing

In ThoughtWorks, we pair on all our development work. That means, every code that is written by two people sitting side by side, connected to a huge monitor and a pair of keyboards/mouse. It’s true for ThoughtWorks worldwide. Silly bugs are caught in time. Programmers don’t get bored. Both folks learn from each other. This is pretty cool.

Truly Global

One of the impressive things about ThoughtWorks is that it is "truly" global. There are several benefits to this. A primary benefit is that we gain an envious geographic diversity when it comes to our client base. What’s in it for me? First off, I get the chance to be involved in emerging markets. Second, I have exposure to cultures that add value to me, as a consultant and as a person.

Strong Values and Embracing Diversity

We have strong values. We make sure every client is comfortable and satisfied with the work we do. Most teams are multicultural and employees are encouraged to work out of the different global offices. ThoughtWorks also has one of the highest male/female employee ratios.

 Flat Organization

ThoughtWorks is an organization with hardly any ‘levels’. There are no cubicles. The open pan means one can walk up to anyone else to question, challenge and chat. Every individual is respected and can voice their opinions. Speaking of which, at ThoughtWorks, we can pick any title we want for our business card.

Complete Transparency

The no cubicle culture also means that ThoughtWorks is a very comfortable space to work in. If we want to know what’s happening on project X, we approach its team and talk to them. If we want to attend a session, we are most welcome. If we want to work on a different project with our favorite tech-stack, we meet the Professional Services Manager(PSM).

It works the other way too, if we delivered a session that was not upto the mark, people will come up to us and tell us how we can do better. You are always surrounded with positive energy and vibration.

 Comfort and Fun

We have tons of outings, meetups and fun! Working at ThoughtWorks is like working from home. I found each day so compelling that I sometimes didn’t really want to go back home.