Welcome Kingsley Chu, a Software Solution Engineer for IBM

Kingsley Chu is a 22 year old Software Engineering student at Queen's University, discussing his time as an intern for IBM.

Tell me about a job that really stuck out in your mind.

My most recent job was an internship at IBM (International Business Machines), under their Watson software solutions departments. I was a software solution engineer, where I supported IBM’s business to business (B2B) solution products. Very technical stuff, a lot of computer knowledge is required. Not everyones cup of tea, a blend of interpersonal communication with a lot of technical knowledge as well.

What were your main roles in the company?

I worked there for 16 months. For exactly the first 15 months I worked at the position I was at as the engineer, and then in my final month I was switched over to staff software developer, where I was actually building code and working with actual features before deployment. I got switched due to a combination of unclear planning, unforeseen circumstances and a lot of middle management involvement.

The job was helping clients troubleshoot problems and productions. I would spend a lot of time speaking to customers, working with them to work out what’s wrong with their system, as well as working through the coding to try and figure out what went wrong. Very diverse position, working on a multitude of things, whether that be fixing problems for customers, or clients coming to you asking “How do I optimize this?” and seeing the best way to go about.

Did you enjoy this job?

It definitely could've been worse. I didn't necessarily enjoy the job itself, but everything that came with the job was really good. So the position I was in and the product I was working on doesn't provide a lot of easily transferrable skills. It’s a very niche job. We were using IBMs very proprietary language, so unless you’re working with this particular model, there’s not a lot of room for growth in other areas. They were training us to basically stay at IBM. So the potential for growth wasn't widely applicable compared to other positions, which is why I feel the job itself wouldn't be that personally enjoyable.

How would you describe the overall atmosphere/environment?

So the environment there was very interesting. They have a very interesting work flow, where the environment is set up in a way that meant, apart from the other interns in my team, I never saw any other team members faces. I had no idea what they looked like, as they were situated all across North America and Europe. We would all log in at the same time on a 9-5 work day, and work with each other, but only through the computer.

You could actually come into work with shorts if you wanted to, even though your not supposed to. The cubicles we would sit in had massive walls with sliding doors. If you wanted to, you could take a nap and no would know. Your boss could walk by and not know you were there. It’s very easy to not get noticed whilst there, given how big the product and the department is. It required a lot of self-regulation and self discipline. You could go down to the other floors where the other team members were and chill and work with them. It was very relaxed, you could work from home if you wanted to. It had a very university feel to some of the style of work I ended up doing. I think they’re definitely trying to modernize and stay relevant. They had a nice cafeteria, open concept. Probably one of the highlights of my job was the free snacks.

What was the workload like?

I would have a lot of work due, but still find time to chill and relax for a bit. The work also did vary a lot. Most of the time it was important and significant, but not urgent. Maybe once or twice a week there would be an emergency, where a client would report a systems meltdown, and they would need all available operators and support members to get on the call right now. This would happen sometimes, and it would be very stressful. You would need to drop everything right now and get on the phone or video chat and talk to the client. It’s very “GO! GO! GO!”, like a firefighter. The work can also be just responding to emails, calls, issues and so on. You’ll never finish your work. Especially in emergencies, when they're declared severity 1, which is the worst it can be. There were really tough days where I had a lot of severity 1 cases.

What’s interesting is that in emails and in person, we were told we’d be working on about 15 cases per month. We ended up doing close to 20 cases a week. They weren't all urgent, but the when they started to pile up that’s when it got very tough.

During severity 1 cases, I would get high up managers messaging me, some for the first time, saying “Are you on this case right now? You’d better be on it.” This would happen whilst I’m on the phone to the client dealing with the severe cases. I talked to hundreds of people over my 16 months there, some of them it was only once and I’d never speak to them again, like these scenarios here. The entire 15 months I was there I saw my boss maybe 3 or 4 times. That was it.

Do you feel like your time there has benefitted you, even though you mentioned there isn't a huge chance to grow?

Absolutely. You have to learn how to be very self-regulated and focused. If you’ve worked on your backlog for the day, and customers haven't responded yet, you could choose to just chill, take a nap or whatever. Me and my friends there often chose to use that time to work on code, separate projects, or come up with different ideas to improve ourselves both within and outside of the job. It’s all down to you. You could chill the entire 16 months, or spend that time improving yourself. I was able to do so, not necessarily through the actual work itself, more from the chances I had at the job.

If given the chance, would you go back?

I would definitely consider it, even knowing what it’s like, and how stressful the workload can get. I could have 10 cases already and at once get assigned 5 more. But I would say the benefits do outweigh the negatives. You get very flexible working locations. It’s helpful to learn this product, as it’s very niche, and there’s not a lot of people who know this kind of stuff, so going back to IBM would be easier for me compared to someone just starting out.

What advice would you give someone at the start of the same or similar job?

Don’t be complacent and satisfy easily just by finishing your 9-5 job. Always make the effort to go above and beyond, not necessarily always for your work, but more for yourself. You can always improve your own skills, whether that be coding for me, or skills that are more marketable to other employers. That would be very key for returning to this position. Find other ways for self-improvement, as you only have yourself to be accountable to. No ones really going to come up to you with the chance to get better, it’s up to you to find those opportunities.

Watch Kingsley's tips on how to get hired in Software Engineering

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