I have been working as a software developer for three years now and have since worked on a number of different projects: collecting and managing industrial data, visualizing location data, a payroll application and an internal business application. The latter may not have been the most exciting topic of the bunch. Yet, there were several aspects and people involved in this project that were inspirational for my work in the future.

It was the first project that I only worked on in corona times, from start to finish, from the end of October to the beginning of March. I haven't seen our empty office for a long time now. Every customer and team meeting was online, so the communication dynamics differed enormously from previous projects. Offline information travels differently, more spontaneously and directly. Communication and staying in touch were essential during this project. We worked in a team of 3-4, and we had daily stand-ups to keep track of what everyone was working on. This helped us respond quickly to upcoming issues. They came up earlier; scope changes could therefore be followed closely. We managed to get numerous features into the application, even more than we initially planned, which was very satisfying.

One of the things I was excited about when I started on the new project was following and learning about the setup in Azure DevOps. However, due to the size of the project and the short deadline, it didn't feel right to follow a colleague for half a day or more. Working remotely and time pressure certainly had something to do with that. I still want to learn the ins and outs, so I'll remember that for another time.

One of my colleagues was brought on board only for this project, but there were little space and time to co-program and keep him fully informed. When the project ended for him, it was bizarre to say goodbye to someone you've only seen virtually.

Working with your client, proposing your own ideas, and seeing them evolve into the final product gave me a sense of accomplishment

Tight planning and prioritization felt essential to make this project a success. I definitely felt the pressure to do that, even though I thought I can't handle pressure very well. Now that I have learned that I can do this, it offers more perspective for the future, making me more resilient. At least, that's what I believe.

Working with your client, proposing your own ideas, and seeing them evolve into the final product gave me a sense of accomplishment. This is only possible in a customer relationship if you listen and trust each other's competence.

I am happy to have had the opportunity to work on this project. It was absolutely different from the things I had worked on before, and I learned a lot.