Sisters Gaia and Olga joined Le Wagon Lisbon in early 2021, studying Web Dev and Data Science respectively. Read more about them on this double interview and find out how the bootcamp helped them kickstart new career(s) in tech!
Summary
Hello girls, and thank you for your time! Let’s take a step back: what did you do before Le Wagon?
Gaia: I have been working for 2+ years as Customer Success Manager in tech startups.
Olga: Just before Le Wagon, I was a psychology student at the University of Milan.
And what made you consider learning how to code?
G: Working in tech startups made me realize how cool it would be to join a product team and work closely with engineers on product development. I saw a great opportunity in Le Wagon’s Web Development bootcamp to make my first steps into coding and so to see whether, later on, I would prefer to work in development or product management.
O: I always had a great passion for maths and statistics. During my university years I had focused on humanities, leaving this part of me aside. After my graduation, I realized I wanted to look at social changes and human behaviour from a broader perspective, even bigger than the one you can have with a degree in sociology - and this can be achieved through big data analysis. Talking about it with my sister, she mentioned Le Wagon and I decided to join their Data Science bootcamp in Lisbon.
G: I’m very fascinated by technology. Tech companies are for me great schools for learning, working in stimulating environments on innovative projects. I was already working in tech startups, joining Le Wagon was then the opportunity to move into an even more tech-related job.
O: As I mentioned, I think that to have a broader vision on social issues and human behaviours you need to look at them from a bigger perspective. The analysis of data can help us with it. Last but not least, I was also aware of the much bigger amount of job opportunities for a 23-year old who knows how to code.
Gaia in Web Dev and Olga in Data Science, you both attended the Le Wagon remotely. How was your experience?
G: The online bootcamp was very well organized and totally ready to be fully taught remotely. Of course I wished we could have been on campus to meet better with the others, but all in all I think we managed anyway to build nice connections and get good quality learning.
O: I was living anyway in Lisbon and I had the opportunity to stay at least on the campus for a week. I have to say that, even if it was online, I succeeded in making great relationships with my colleagues and teachers! This helped me out so much in the thought moment of the campus (eg. the project).
What did you enjoy the most during these 9 weeks?
G: Fully understanding the key aspects of front-end vs back-end work, having the possibility of trying out different languages and frameworks and so to understand what I like the most and would like to explore further.
O: Always learning something new, challenges and having someone to share my work with. I also really appreciated that after the daily lecture we would start practicing immediately: from theory to practice in less than 2 hours!Gaia and her batch during the #555 virtual Demo Day.
I know you girls recently landed new tech jobs. Congratulations! Can you explain to us briefly your new positions?
G: I work as a Junior Product Owner for Nezasa, a travel tech company. My job is to plan and coordinate the work of my team for the next sprint, making sure everyone has work to do and is happy while doing so. I'm also involved in keeping the different teams in the company informed and trained on new features implementations.
O: I’m working in financial consulting. I’m in the team of Business Process Improvement and Digital in Milan. The job is all about process digitization for big financial companies (mainly banks), helping them in keeping up with the new tools and technologies and new normatives on the usage of data.
And finally, what do you think is the #1 rule for getting the most out of the bootcamp?
G: Don’t be afraid to ask for help, don’t get demotivated because it seems that nothing will stick to your head. Somehow, on your final project days, everything magically comes together, and it feels so good!
O: Always keeping on track. It’s very intense, you will learn a lot of things in a very short time - someday you just cannot believe that you will remember what they just taught you, but somehow you will. I think that resilience must be your main focus during the bootcamp and at the end of the day you just have to trust the process.
Thank you so much for sharing your experiences and precious advices!
