For the past 3 years, Subtonomy has been a proud partner of Tekniksprånget. This is a groundbreaking internship program which allows graduates of natural sciences or technical highschools to join a company within the field of their interest and try the life of an engineer for 4 months.The project is run by the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences (IVA) and over 220 companies across Sweden currently participate. In August 2023, we welcomed Lina who not only completed her internship in our DevOps department, but actually decided to extend it by another 4 months! Here’s her story:
What was the first day of your engineering internship like?
The day I started my internship, the very first thing I got to do was join the daily stand-up meeting. Not only was it my first ever work meeting, but it was also filled with terms relating to telecom and Subtonomy’s different products which, of course, were entirely new to me. It was almost a bit overwhelming, and I wouldn’t have thought that just a month or two later those meetings would be an easy and natural part of my every day. After the meeting I got help with setting up my computer and workspace, and after lunch I had already been assigned my first task! It was all very exciting.
The tasks I got to work on during my internship mainly related to the UI, and ranged from fixing small bugs to adding new functionality. In the beginning it was mainly small bug fixes or things like changing the amount of decimals shown on a graph, but as I learned more about programming and got more familiar with the project I got to take on bigger tasks, working on a majority of Subtonomy’s applications and learning five different programming languages in the process!
My favorite task however was adding a way to copy and paste dates directly into a date-picker, instead of the user having to select the day and time individually. It was fun since I had to both code the functionality of it, and also decide how it should look. I feel like I learned a lot while working on this task. It felt especially rewarding since I knew it was a feature that the customer would get a real use out of, and I even received feedback afterwards that they were happy with how it turned out!
Did you discover anything new about yourself and your approach to work during your internship?
I think I’ve gained more confidence about approaching tasks that might seem daunting at first or are a bit above my current skill level, since I now know that I will learn as I go and that it’s okay to do that. Especially when knowing that I’m surrounded by a team of people with loads of experience who are happy to share with me…so long as I’m not afraid to ask questions. In fact, the people were my favorite part about working at Subtonomy! I felt included in the devops team since day one. I got to work on real projects as opposed to some made-up “intern tasks”, which felt very rewarding. I was given the trust and the space to make real contributions to the company while also being allowed to learn and make mistakes along the way, since everyone was always ready to answer my questions and offer help and feedback when I needed it.
What is the one thing you will be taking away from working with Subtonomy?
The one thing I will take away from working with Subtonomy, other than better programming skills, is what I’ve learned about the development process itself, since that part is difficult to truly get from just studying or working on a project by yourself.
Oh, and the incredible view of Stockholm we get from our office has probably forever raised my standards for what counts as nice scenery.
Looking back at my four months at Subtonomy, I feel very lucky that I was able to not only do Tekniksprånget, but that I ended up at this company in particular. It has been a very welcoming and enjoyable experience that taught me a lot, and I’m happy to say that I will continue working at Subtonomy next year as well!
//Lina Kollberg