Interview with our first employee

it-economics is celebrating its 20th birthday this year. The first employee Robert is still with the company after 1 years and told us a bit about the it-economics spirit, changes, projects and co.

Hi Robert – you are ja our longest employee. Tell me Just, what you are doing here.

I am Robert and am 2006 too it economics came as a junior developer. I was particularly interested in Java development and I received an offer from it-economics in this area.

Was that your first job after graduation? And how did it go then? 

Yes, exactly, I started working here right after my studies, back then as a backend developer. In the meantime, however, I have passed through various stations such as frontend and app development to have ended up back in the backend. I'm now a solution architect and I also take care of big data and data analytics.

Are these your heart issues?

Definitely, that's why I'm also trying these within it economics to advance and inspire people to do so.

Would you like to go into a bit more detail about the stations that you went through with us?

I started when I was a junior. When you start your professional life fresh from your studies, you first have to learn the basic things. For example, how such a project actually runs. Also important to me was the question of what skills or know-how I need to build up in order to create added value for the customer. 
Initially, all developers (including the founders) were together in a project in which we supported each other. At that time I had a colleague who really advanced me technologically. He was kind of a role model for me. But not only the technological is important in the project, but also how do you behave, what are the work processes like or how do we deal with customers.

Tell me about one of your first projects.

At that time we had a mixture of agility and waterfall with the customer. But we wanted to be really agile and introduced it ourselves. And now this customer is actually agile and we still work together. It was a long process and there were some new methodologies to learn for the developers as well.

But that was certainly very exciting, given the entire process of agile Transformation to be there, right? 

Totally yes, mainly because the customer didn't want it at all in the beginning, especially not the management. We then have a kind at the beginning scrum introduced to our team, amidst the customer's waterfall model. We practically did our thing, but of course we still implemented the requirements of the stakeholders. This is how we gradually established agility in the company. 

Was that also your highlight project? 

So my highlight at the beginning was definitely that I could learn a lot and the developers of it economics mye Idoler were. That was the steepest part of my learning curve. 
But I have accompanied many beautiful projects that I like to work on think back. 
I'm thinking about a project at an energy company where I work with colleagues for two lived and worked in Düsseldorf for months. There were four of us and we shared one airbnbapartment and drove to the customer every day together. In the end we spent the entire two months together, so not only in the project but also after work. It was really an extraordinary experience.  
But in general each project had its own charm. Sometimes it was simply the people you worked with or the product that I thought about day and night to find solutions. So there are different types of highlights.

After such a long time, it's understandable that you have multiple highlights. You have now been with us for over 16 years it economics. Did you expect that at the beginning?

I never would have thought that. When I finished studying, I was only looking for a temporary job and said directly in the interview that I would only be staying for six months. At the time, I wanted to go to Canada to work there. Well, and now the six months have turned into 16 years. 

Did you then think about trying something new and changing employers?

there havee I've often thought about it. I havee spoke to our CEO at the time that I would like to change, not just the project, but actually the employer. It economics war at the time still very small and I was always in the same project.  
But in the end I was given new areas of responsibility. At the time, I wanted to introduce and look after the topic of mobile apps. The management then gave me the opportunity to start the topic and build up a small team. Then we had our first project at an insurance company and in the meantime the mobile app development has become something big. That motivates me to keep going and to stay with a company in the long term. I was always shown new perspectives and given more responsibility. That convinced me.

Is there anything that you miss from before?

The company has grown quite a bit and now we don't know each other as well as we used to. That certainly has something to do with Corona. But sometimes I miss being in the office together. The company is no longer so self-sufficient, which offers natural but also new opportunities.

What chances?

Es are many more customers and many more different projects. This gives you the opportunity to try out many things and learn new things. I can decide for myself in which direction I want to develop. Internally, too, you have the opportunity to familiarize yourself with many topics and change jobs, which didn't exist before.

You are currently working on a project for an insurance company – do you like it?

I really like it because the insurance group has a lot of projects to offer. In January I'll switch to a car project within the customer. I think so insurancefield very interesting, not only technically, but also technologically. I don't even care if I like the product. It's important to me that I'm part of a team that wants to develop further, looks for new solutions and implements ideas together. We all have the opportunity to bring in suggestions and improvements. That's reason enough for me to enjoy being part of a project. 

You really have a lot of energy and knowledge inside it economics plugged. What are your plans for the future??

my goal at it economics it is, in addition to the project business, teams zu entwickeln and build up. I would like amake motivate and for technologies inspire and pass on my knowledge. I want not only that the people are fit for the project, but also instill in them curiosity and a desire for something new. I experienced that myself back then and I want it that way also continue.

This is a remarkable goal and will it economics move forward safely. Which technologies that we do not yet offer or support do you think will become interesting in the future?

There will always be new technologies that we don't cover. Of course, this is also a strategic decision. For example Machine Learning or AI covers a larger area within Big Data. Ob we will add the topic in the near future our current one customers really need is but just the question. It is also important to convince our customers that the technology will bring advantages for them. But in the end, no matter in which area, something will always change and new technologies will be added. It remains exciting.

So let's just let that come to us. Thank you for your time and the insights into 16 years at it economics.