top of page
Search

The First Digital Internship Experience - Luke Mross

First Digital

Updated: Oct 12, 2022

Luke started his Internship journey with First Technology Digital in January 2022. He comes from the Belgium Campus and he joined our Innovation & IoT team.



The internship experience

As an intern and the designated “newbie” to the team, I was assigned to the “Innovations and IoT” department. I soon became familiar with the business processes and workings within the department and in no time was assigned to my first project with a senior developer to guide me. Being that this was my first job as a software engineer it was a bit of a shock to my system in the initial stages, often filled with frustration, but thanks to a lot of help from my mentor/ senior developer and a good support structure within our project team, I was able to cope and grow not only as a developer but also as a person.


Being a bit of an impatient person when I started out, I wanted results now and would often beat myself up for not achieving my sometimes-over-ambitious goals or for not grasping a concept on the first attempt which would often lead to lengthy, venting sessions with my senior developer. At some point, my senior shared a saying with me: “Dripping water hollows out stone, not through force but through persistence.” It became clear to me that I had to be patient with myself and that the climb to the top would be a slow incline, not an exponential jump. The internship has not been a walk in the park thus far, but I am grateful to my senior and the team for being there to pick me up when I’ve fallen.


The First Digital Culture

I try to lead a life of balance and if I had to describe the culture here at First Digital, it would be just that: “Balanced”. There is a time for work and there is a time for play, and it feels like First Digital have struck gold when applying this concept. I have had many fun experiences in the team building sessions we have had but in the same breath I have also been shown how to knuckle down and get the job done. Whether at the offices or online in an MS Teams meeting, you can always expect a little bit of banter and jokes, all be it some atrocious dad jokes, between the team members. My department and team welcomed me with open arms and immediately incorporated me as an equal among the team members in the social sense. I have gotten to know my teammates on a personal level outside of work hours and truly feel as if they are a second family.


What I have learned

At First Digital I feel that there is always a nudge for self-improvement whether it be through certifications or just upskilling yourself through exercises and training sessions hosted by the senior developers. I employ the “T-method” of learning, that being having a broad understanding of different areas in the development environment and then having a deep understanding or specialisation of a particular area and I can honestly attest to First Digital supporting my method learning. I have learned many different skills such as Azure DevOps, and front-end dev but I have really been allowed to shine while working with C# in back-end development, learning technologies related to web application development like Blazor and MVC.


During my tenure as an intern here at First Digital I have grown in leaps and bounds in my development work and I am without a doubt a cut above the developer that walked into the offices in January 2022. The constant nudging for self-improvement from management and from my senior has been an extraordinary help to me and I look forward to my eventual climb to the top.


Luke Mross

Innovation & IoT


116 views0 comments

Recent Posts

See All

Comments


bottom of page