Manuela-Lidia Grindei

"My personality types are: Coordinator, Influencer and Trainer. I think I scored highest on these as my role does indeed require strong organisational skills, great communication with both technical and non-technical colleagues, as well as mentoring junior developers."

"I have been in software engineering for about 10 years and developed products in different fields - flavours&fragrances, telecom, gaming, insurance, investment banking, payments. I have been involved in these projects at all levels, from requirements analysis, design, actual dev work, testing, deployments, supporting the live products. I like the impact I can make in the lives of the users of the applications I bring to life. The work is demanding, but very interesting and the field is constantly changing and innovating. The starting salary for a software engineer depends a lot on the industry and size of the company, but should be around 40 000£ per annum for a junior as far as I know. "

"My background is fairly standard, I was made an internship offer, then became a permanent employee of the company. After working full-stack for about 3 years in my country, I moved to London after being headhunted on LinkedIn. I could see a great potential in London as a tech hub, and was not disappointed - it provides countless meet up groups, trainings, conferences and a lot of companies hiring IT professionals. I spent here almost 7 years, first as mid-level developer, and since last year senior-level. I would say my involvement outside work in different meet ups and volunteering initiatives has proved crucial in shaping me for a senior-level position."

"In my free time, I like to volunteer for code clubs with children to spread the love for programming and to encourage children with diverse backgrounds to consider a career in Computer Science. I also like travelling, visiting famous European cities and castles, and was planning to go to Tuscany before the pandemic started."

"I am currently working on a payments project in an agile team of developers. I am involved in the requirements analysis and the design of new functionality for our product, as well as doing a lot of the actual coding and testing. I frequently have meetings - both technical discussions with other developers/architects/testers, and our regular Scrum ceremonies (planning, refinement and retrospective) with the whole team, including management. I am also heavily involved in mentoring and knowledge-sharing with the new joiners and industrial placements. I may occasionally participate in recruitment activities, such as representing the company at events or interviewing candidates for the vacancies in my team. "

"I have started with a Bachelor in Computer Science in Romania (with my 3rd year spent as Erasmus student in Germany), then continued with a Master's in Computer Science in France. After completing my education, I was offered an internship, and then received a permanent offer from the company."