Reflecting on Two Years at Microsoft

Today, the 16th of August 2023, makes it exactly two (2) years since I joined Microsoft as a software engineer, and it has been a journey of unlearning, learning, and relearning! Given the global economic downturn and multiple tech layoffs, I’m deeply grateful to God that this is the story of my first promotion and not a layoff. <h2>August 2021 — Team formation</h2> The global Windows organization at Microsoft decided to set up shop at their Lagos site, and thus our team was birthed. I came as part of the second batch of engineers. The first batch was hired earlier, around May of that year, the third batch came in the last quarter of the year, and a couple more folks would join in 2022. The first four months were pretty much uneventful. Our teams were just being formed; we had no official task assigned to us, so we just spent the time trying to learn whatever we felt was necessary. Big tech recruitment focuses on computer science fundamentals, that is, problem-solving with data structures and algorithms using any programming language you know. So more often than not, you will have to learn (ramp up on) the language and/or framework your team uses after joining. The rationale for this is that if you’re solid on the fundamentals, you can very easily pick up any programming language and/or framework. Also, with a focus on the fundamentals, there’ll be no sentimental attachment to any tool. You use what’s best for the project or even create a new one. Our team mostly uses C++/Winrt and XAML (sometimes C# for prototyping), so we spent most of that time ramping up on these in addition to learning about the culture at Microsoft. We were literally being paid to learn for four months. As someone coming from a startup life where you had to be productive from day 1, this was scary. <a href="https://betterprogramming.pub/reflecting-on-2-years-at-microsoft-b9b98b37d57a">Read More</a>