Moving through new cities and tech industries
Padena Rasouli-Baghban reflects on venturing out of her comfort zone and how it led to an exciting career in software development, spanning across telecommunications, semiconductors and big tech.
Padena Rasouli-Baghban (she/her), a fourth-year Software Engineering student, talks about her challenging yet rewarding adventure exploring new cities and industries during co-op. Her experiences helped her grow her career while learning more about herself and how to navigate moving to new places and entering new roles.
Her co-op journey highlights how working in a variety of industries helped her gain multiple perspectives in software engineering. She got to see first-hand how different industries move and what kind of work she enjoys.
Padena's co-op journey
Software developer intern, TD Bank
Padena worked in the Innovation Labs, where she worked on developing and prototyping various innovative products for customers.
DevOps software developer intern, Advanced Micro Devices (AMD)
Within the team that primarily focused on DevOps, Padena was tasked with building tools that other developers could use to make their workflow more seamless.
Software developer intern, Bell
When Padena moved into the telecommunications industry, she worked on front-end software that Bell stores use to set up and sell phone plans.
Software engineer intern, Microsoft
In Seattle, Washington, Padena spent two work terms in Microsoft's advertising division. She worked on software that businesses could use to set up ad campaigns.
Production engineering intern, Meta
Padena's final work term was spent in Menlo Park, California. At Meta, she worked on the privacy team, where she worked on site reliability and software development.
Q&A with Padena
How have you adjusted to moving to new cities and what did you enjoy about them?
“It’s definitely scary to start with, especially because my last three co-ops were in the United States and I had never been there before, so I didn’t know what to expect. I live pretty close to Waterloo with my family, so I never had the opportunity to go on a flight by myself or anything like that. I was lucky since the places I was working for had good relocation support and there were other interns as well. It felt better since there was a community of people helping out.”
“Once I took the flight and landed there, I was able to settle in. It was a fun opportunity to brainstorm places I wanted to visit and plan all the different things I wanted to see. I really enjoyed it in the end. It gave me a better sense of how to pack all my things in one suitcase and live somewhere new for four months.”
“I really enjoyed the nature in new places. When I’m in Waterloo on a study term, I’m inside so much of the time, either in a campus building or at home. While I was gone, I got to go on a lot of different hikes and explore nature a lot more. In Seattle, there are so many mountains and trees. In California, there’s a lot of hiking trails. I don’t see myself as a nature person, but that was my favourite part of moving to those new cities.”
What has been the most challenging thing about co-op?
“The uncertainty of it all. When you’re applying, you don’t really know where you might end up or how things are going to work out. Even after landing a job, I’ve always felt like I wasn’t sure if I actually knew what I was supposed to be doing when I got there.”
“Those first few weeks when you’re adjusting to all the different expectations and trying to get a good sense of how you can contribute when everything is so new is also challenging. At the same time, it’s positive because it forced me out of my comfort zone and so there were a lot of learning moments.”
What have you learned about working in so many different industries over your co-op terms?
“I think working in different industries was a valuable experience in seeing what sort of things I like and don’t like in work. It showed me how I can apply software engineering in different contexts. For example, I got to see how software is used in a more hardware focused company versus a software focused company, and I saw how their priorities differed and how that reflected in the code I had to write.”
“It also showed me the pace at which different industries move. In a tech company, they’re most likely updating their software really often, so things move really fast. In the banking industry, there’s a lot more regulations and layers of people to pass things through to make sure that something is good for customers and their financial situations. That was a different pace where things moved slower.”
“The innovations and technologies that companies used were also different because the users have different needs based on the industry. It was really valuable to see how software engineering applied in those contexts and where I fit in that picture.”
What is your proudest co-op achievement?
“My first time getting something out to users was probably my biggest achievement. For my fifth co-op, I was returning to the same team so they were already familiar with my skillset. They put me on a project that was really important to the team, so I was contributing similar to the level of a junior engineer versus a co-op student.”
“That was a really valuable experience because I got to sit in meetings where they were talking to product managers and deciding what was most important for this new feature they were developing. It was a long process working with people in different roles. Then, making sure that I was writing code in a timely fashion so that the feature could go out to users on time was another challenge.”
“It was a user-facing feature, so the buttons I created and different tiles I coded would actually be used by companies who wanted to make advertisements on our website. I thought it was really cool and a nice chance to build something that people are using and that was important to the team I was part of.”
What's next for you?
“Top of mind is that I’ll be graduating this year, so I’m just trying to finish school. Beyond that, I’ll see where it goes.”