Amazon Discover: Spring Insight Participant Review

On Day 1, the software development engineers in Amazon described what a day in Amazon looks like for us, which let me have a basic understanding of the operation in Amazon. Apart from that, the Leadership Principles of Amazon also let me know what kinds of employees they want. In the afternoon, the mentor taught us how to meet the requirements of the clients during the process of software development and some techniques of Object-Oriented Programming. I think would be very useful for my future career in software engineering. On Day 2, I have been taught how to do preparation for the technical interview, and my mentor gave us a series of interview coding questions for practice. The content of Day 2 has taught me how to properly prepare for an interview to get an internship. This will definitely help me a lot in applying for an internship at Amazon next year. On Day 3, our group have done software testing exercises. Mentor taught us how to do unit testing to cover every case as more as possible to make the code better. Overall, this year's spring technology insight programme was unforgettable, the practical knowledge I learned during these three days is hard to gain from university. So I am very grateful to Amazon for giving me such a valuable opportunity.

Although I have learned all the technical skills mentioned in the technical workshops (e.g Object-Oriented Programming, Unit Testing, Graph theory) from university previously, I didn't yet know how these skills can be applied in a real working environment before attending this programme. The new skill I learned from this year's spring technology insight programme is about technical interviews. I have learned how to be well prepared for the technical interview by doing coding exercises before the interview. And also don't be shy to ask questions and share your thoughts with interviewers, it is good to let them know how you think.

This year's spring technology insight programme gave me a deeper understanding of Amazon's internal labour division and it let me know: For a giant tech company like Amazon, it needs a large variety of positions to operate. Employees' roles cannot be directly divided into business and technology as they are closely linked to each other. So I found out that I want to be more than a software engineer in the future. I also can be a data analyst. Understanding all about the business and potential roles available in Amazon has broadened my horizon about careers selection.

According to the 16 Amazon Leadership Principles, Amazon has its own startup culture. It maintains the energy that most startups have. The drive and constant pursuit for excellence. Most organizations that have attained the level of success that Amazon is on, slowly begin to withdraw and let things play out without putting in much effort as they did at the beginning. The employees still work as hard as they were when Amazon was still trying to build a brand. The consistency at Amazon is a work culture to embrace. In addition, Amazon actively recruits people from diverse backgrounds, races, and genders. I really appreciate their cultures of diversity, equity and inclusion in Amazon.

I pretty much enjoyed this experience. The insight definitely helps me a lot in applying for an internship at Amazon next year. This year's spring technology insight programme was unforgettable, the practical knowledge I learned during these three days is hard to gain from university. So I am very grateful to Amazon for giving me such a valuable opportunity. I would definitely recommend this spring technology insight programme to incoming early year students from my university.

Yes

1. A proper CV and resume should be provided for the application. Show your ambitions and strength in your CV and resume. 2. The Amazon Leadership Principles should be remembered before doing the online assessment. 4. Fundamental knowledge of Computer Science like algorithms and data structures should be consolidated during university if you want to apply for Computer Science related positions. 3. Make proper preparation for the interview. Especially for the technical interview, practice the coding problems on Leetcode or other online-judge platforms 4. Don't be shy to ask questions and share your thoughts with interviewers during the interviews, it is good to let them know how you think.