Let’s start at the beginning. I ended up at Optis over five years ago as an intern, and I was more than happy to stay when they offered me a full-time position. I’ve noticed that a lot of my colleagues started working here for the same reason, and it’s easy to see why. At Optis, you get the freedom to choose your own path, both during your internship and afterward, even on a day-to-day basis.  

Back then, I knew I wanted to learn more about Java and JavaScript, so I specifically searched for possibilities in that area. Optis lets you choose not only your own technology stack, but your responsibilities and which project you want to work on as well! In the five years since then, I’ve learned to work with a lot of other technologies: Angular, React, Vue.JS, and many more.

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Fast forward to today. As a fullstack developer, I have to wear many hats. Everything from requirements analysis to designing the UI/UX is possible. That’s why it’s important to take part in the daily stand-up each morning and let the team know what I’ll be working on. This is also the time to bring up any issues or challenges that I’m facing in my project. Since we work in agile teams, it’s important to communicate about our code, bugs and design choices continuously. We usually track that process on a Kanban or Scrum board.

The content of my workday differs based on how far the agile development sprint has come along. At the beginning of the sprints, I start my day knowing that I will mostly focus on development. By the end, however, my days are mostly filled with debugging, testing, and even some operational responsibilities if we work in a DevOps environment. I also have slightly more meetings by the end of the two weeks. I spend the last days on discussing this sprint and planning the next with client, and I often present demos to showcase our progress.  

What I like most about this way of working is that the constant adaptation to new technologies and tools helps to broaden my vision and keeps me on my toes. It’s part of my daily job to develop applications that really make the difference. For example, last year I helped develop an app that lets operators control cranes remotely through a HoloLens. That was so cool! I think that I’m one of the few people that can say that they learn something new and exciting every day.

Being a consultant also means that there’s always a new team to work in, and new people to work with. Developing those soft skills alongside my coding knowledge makes me feel like I’m really growing as a person. Optis helps me in both areas with their training budget. Every year, you get a budget to spend as you like: you can follow traditional or remote courses, but you can also attend conferences or purchase any educational material that interests you. I’m currently using my budget to learn about reactive programming, for which I’m scheduling some time regularly!

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We also organise monthly Optis Tech Talks, where my colleagues explain a specific technology or trend that they are passionate about. Through these and other initiatives, Optis ensures that we still feel like a team, even though we’re spread across different clients and projects.