What brought you to Spiral Scout?
I have been lucky enough to have been part of the company’s team from almost the beginning, joining Spiral Scout as their 7th full-time employee in 2014. When I was taking my first steps into the world of frontend development with Spiral Scout, I was required to rewrite obsolete flash-games into Javascript, so I had a lot of work. The learning curve was huge but the career growth I knew I would experience (unlike my previous job) was a great motivator to continue to work hard here alongside the Spiral team.
What did you do before joining Spiral Scout?
When I was choosing my major at university, I didn’t actually think I wanted to be a programmer. Although I really liked it and I participated in different competitions, I didn’t want to sit all day and all night in front of the computer. It felt too unsociable and seemed to fall into too many of the other stereotypical features of a programmer. As a result, I began studying economics – but fate intervened in curious ways. At first, the Dean of the Faculty asked me to make a website for the department. I then later progressed and got a second degree in programming, and after a while, met the right people (more on that later).
Regarding previous work, before Spiral Scout I had been working as a Computer Science teacher in a school for seven years and in parallel as an economist in a sewing company.
What do you value the most?
Here’s a little story:
Eight years ago in Brest, Belarus, I was a member of the English Club. In this close circle we communicated in English, played board games, and did a number of different activities. It was there I met Alexei Chepura (Lesha, hi!), who was already a part of Spiral Scout at that point. As part of his kind personality, he regularly offered his help to anyone who wanted to learn programming. Two people, including me, decided to join him. In the evenings, we met in a cafe in a shopping mall and Alexei taught us the basics of frontend development. After a while, the other student left, leaving me to learn 1:1 with Alexei. Within a few months, he began to bring me into projects at Spiral as his ‘apprentice’. Honestly, the first six months were really tough and sometimes we were sitting together analyzing my questions and pain points late into many evenings.
So, why am I sharing this story? Because Alexei was not the only person who was willing to donate his time to help others and make life better for others – all without expecting anything in return. It seems to me that this is the main characteristic of Spiral Scout and people that make up this company in general. One of the best things about Spiral Scout is the people who are always willing to help. They are also really fun to be with and are undoubtedly some of the best professionals in their field.
How does working for Spiral Scout make you feel?
Working at Spiral Scout, I can say with confidence that you will be taken care of. You will not be allowed to burn out. In case a project isn’t interesting for you, you will be given something else that you will feel comfortable with. You are allowed to develop professionally through local meetups, conferences attendance, English lessons and speaking clubs, quizzes, lectures by psychologists, nutritionists, etc.
Just take a look at our Happy Fridays – every other week you can go on a mini-vacation. These are all really good conditions for a healthy work/life balance, career growth, and the unbeatable feeling that you’re not really working because your work is also your hobby!
All these factors give me psychological comfort to work, and satisfaction from its results. Plus, if I have any questions, we have an excellent HR department ready to help at any moment 🙂
What are you most proud of?
During my 8 years with the company, I’ve managed to work with a lot of people from all over the world, such as Canada, the USA, Australia, India, the UK, Poland and more. I am incredibly proud and very happy about the cultural exchange that we get to experience in the process of working with clients around the world. This is a big motivation for me – and as a bonus of such collaborations, I’ve managed to improve my English a lot.
As for the projects, they have also been very diverse. This means I’ve worked on a huge range of business verticals, giving me a diverse understanding of business functions, and not just from a technical point of view. The most memorable project for me would have to be Inturn. They allow brands to get full visibility of goods throughout the supply chain and make a huge impact on business processes.
