5 years at AUCTANE. An interview with Łukasz
Łukasz joined us in 2015 as a Software Engineer. After a short break-up in 2017, he returned and has stayed at AUCTANE to this day. This year, he is celebrating the 5th anniversary of his work. We asked him how AUCTANE changed in recent years, what he does to keep feeling satisfied with his work and what his greatest professional challenges were. See what he replied.
Łukasz, tell us briefly, how did your adventure with AUCTANE start? How do you remember your recruitment process?
Interesting question, since I joined the company twice, when it was still called Metapack. For the first time, in 2015, I came to an interview. I received a few technical questions, we talked about what I have been doing professionally so far. I received quick feedback and joined the company.
In mid-2017, I decided to try something new and return to the company in September 2019. Here, the recruitment process was quite different. I met immediately with Paweł, the director of the department I was supposed to work in. We knew each other from previous work, so we talked mainly about our expectations, about plans, and we decided to cooperate. In retrospect, I have positive memories of both recruitments. Specific conversation, and quick feedback, without the unnecessary dragging on both sides. This is how it should work.
How has your career in our company gone so far?
Quickly, time flies inexorably 🙂
What have you learned during these 5 years of work?
Probably patience, but I think it is mainly thanks to my kids… From the technical side, I certainly had the opportunity to learn about new frameworks, learn and use Terraform, as well as work with the cloud. For sure, I was lucky to be able to create both the front and the backend.
How would you rate your work at AUCTANE over these 5 years? Has a lot changed during this time? Did something surprise you?
These five years, which in my case lasted seven (laughs), were a very big development for the company. I don’t remember exactly how many people worked in 2015, but it was less than 100. Currently, there are nearly 200 people here. I think that over the past few years, there has been a noticeable increase in cooperation between different locations around the world. Every day we have the opportunity, but also the need to agree on the details related to the operation of our applications with colleagues from abroad, which gives us the opportunity to polish the English language.
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Another completely technical aspect is the move towards DevOps. A few years ago, when we were not yet working with the use of the cloud, the programmer’s work was usually limited to preparing changes to the application and preparing appropriate installation scripts. The implementation was performed by assigned people. It was such an obvious period for every programmer when we heard the magic sentence: how come it doesn’t work if it works fine on my end. We have been implementing our solutions in the Amazon cloud for several years. We have the opportunity to prepare the appropriate infrastructure at the development stage, and then embed our code in it. This excludes many problems in production because everything has already been tested not on the programmer’s desk.
5 years is a lot, especially for one job. What is the recipe for a satisfying job regardless of seniority?
I think that each of the programmers differently values the elements of their professional work as satisfaction. However, I will focus here on myself. For me, the most motivating thing is when I know the work done made sense – that it is used by clients. Even if the phone rings in the middle of the night during the shift with information about a production problem, it is a sign that the solution I have contributed to is being used – and well, sometimes something needs to be fixed. It gives me the feeling that the work I was doing was needed.
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Another aspect is the ability to design the solution itself. Sometimes fooling around on figuring out an issue, making a PoC that can be useful for the entire organization. Along with properly performed work, appropriate remuneration must go hand in hand, so as to satisfy everyone. I also think that the people you work with are just as important. A well-coordinated and understanding team is important for everyday work.
What are you the proudest of in your work and career at AUCTANE?
The fact that the product is used by customers is certainly uplifting and motivating. I am pleased that the products that I have co-created since 2015 are still used by end customers. Similarly, the last projects that have been made over the last two years are also used in production – and this is what makes us happy. In our industry, many projects are created to meet the requirements and expectations of our customers or potential customers. However, it often happens that circumstances change and a beautiful code is put on a shelf. Personally, I am also happy that I can design the entire solution – infrastructure, code, and sometimes defining requirements.
Such a wide range of activities is a great responsibility, you must have met many challenges. Do you remember any special situation? How do you deal with challenges at work?
I was sailing on a catamaran across the Atlantic. A storm has caught me. Meanwhile, the phone rang. It was the horror of horrors, Pager Duty. A huge failure in production. I thought I couldn’t do it. But I caught the mast, 2 clicks, quick redeploy and the world was saved. It took me a while to cool down, I woke up in a sweat.
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But seriously, challenges always happen. It is difficult to name a single great challenge that stuck in my memory. Each new project, which can, and sometimes even has to, use tools and technologies that we do not know yet, is definitely something like that. Each challenge can be overcome in a finite time by yourself, the power of Stackoverflow knowledge cannot be overestimated here (laughs). However, colleagues often help to speed up the process.
Finally, would you change your career in retrospect?
No. Each professional challenge has somehow influenced me, how I work, and the way I think. Certainly, many things could have been done differently, I could have made different choices. But I don’t like to complain that a few years ago I might have chosen something else. There is no need to look back and beat your brains out, because you may as well wonder why you didn’t buy a few Bitcoins in 2016 … You should definitely look into the future, and the past can only help in planning what is ahead of you.
