This blog post is by Ami Paghadal, an alumni from our Summer of Tech 2020 programme. She interned at IntegrationWorks. Ami is passionate about supporting more students to succeed through Summer of Tech.

Thank you Ami for sharing your internship story, experience, and top tips for students!

How I found out about Summer of Tech

Like every other final year student, I was looking for an opportunity to apply the skills I gained during my studies and learn more along the way. At the time, I was not quite sure if this opportunity would come my way considering we were in the middle of a global pandemic. However, I was determined to persevere. I used to host a local radio show, and it was during one of these shows meeting a guest speaker mentioned the Summer of Tech internship programme. I hadn’t heard much about this programme at the time, but I did some research and got my profile up and running.

My Summer of Tech journey began

After multiple online meets and greet and many zoom interviews, I had reached the final stage - offers day. I was incredibly lucky to have received multiple offers and decided to go with IntegrationWorks. After all the paperwork was done, it was time to relocate to Wellington. I left Christchurch with a lot of nervousness and excitement, ready to start a new chapter in my life.

Interning at IntegrationWorks

I started at IntegrationWorks where I was given my first project. I am not going to lie, it was pretty overwhelming. I had an idea about serverless architecture, but I didn’t have much JavaScript experience (which was the language chosen to implement our solution).

However, I had a great mentor at IntegrationWorks, Jono, who broke our project into digestible-sized pieces of work and walked me through what I needed to do. Along with working on our internal project, I was given exposure to a range of other new and exciting tools and technologies.

Working at IntegrationWorks meant that I had to learn how to use and implement integration solutions on a range of Integration platforms such as MuleSoft and Dell Boomi. I even managed to get certified in a few during the course of my internship!

It’s funny to think that my Summer of Tech internship has come to end, especially when it feels like I just started! The learning opportunities at IntegrationWorks allowed me not only to grow my technical skills but gave me an insight into a services company from a business point of view.

IntegrationWorks provided continuous support by giving me a buddy to ease my transition into the company and introducing me to past interns that are now full-time employees to learn from their experiences. Having constant access to these co-workers allowed me to feel supported and looked after.

I am so thankful for this experience and am ready to continue this journey as a full-time IntegrationWorks employee!

Top Tips to a successful SoT experience

• Have an open mind towards the opportunities that present themselves to you.

• Immerse yourself in the groups and clubs within the organisation. Make yourself part of the team! Don’t think you can’t just because you’re an intern.

• Get involved in any events companies are running outside of Summer of Tech.

• Know yourself and have a story about your differentiator. Recognize what sets you apart from the crowd.

• Always put your best foot forward.

• It’s not all about your technical ability. From my experience, most companies are looking for culture-fit and someone they want to work with.

• Remember that you always have something to learn from everyone. People are looking for good mentees.

If you are interested in registering for Summer of Tech - woohoo!

Click here to get started at summeroftech.co.nz/register/.

Have questions, comments, concerns? Easy - let us know at info@summeroftech.co.nz.