You study and live in France, why did you decide to do an internship at BOC Group in Austria?
“As part of my studies at the Ecole Centrale de Lyon, I had to do a 3-month internship. I was very interested in getting work experience abroad, and I had friends who were coming to Vienna to do their internship over the same period, so I started to look for an internship in Vienna too. I’m studying general engineering but I’m starting to specialize in computer science, so I wanted to gain experience through my internship in this field, in which I have always been interested.
I heard about BOC Group from a previous intern and it totally corresponded to what I was looking for. It was also a great opportunity to join an international team. So when you offered me an internship, I was delighted to join BOC Group, in the Vienna office!”
How were your first steps during this internship and how did you experience working abroad?
“When I arrived, I immediately felt very welcome. In the first few weeks, I had time to learn more about BOC with the onboarding of new employees. It allowed me to discover what the other teams are working on and how they interact with each other. In the meantime, I also did the onboarding within my team, to learn how to use the tools and to gain knowledge on the topic of my internship.It was great to have time to gain a general understanding before actually working on my specific internship subject, so I didn’t feel lost at first in this new company. I really liked living in Vienna. It’s a beautiful city and it’s nice to live in. I spent the weekends visiting new places and museums, enjoying my time here. Working abroad is a great experience to meet new people and discover a new country, so I would totally recommend it.”
What were your tasks and objectives during your internship?
“I was in the production line team, working on contract testing. It’s a new type of tests for microservices architecture, to test the interactions between two services of an application that need to exchange data. These tests have many benefits but they weren’t implemented in BOC yet. Some research was done before, and the objective of my internship was to continue to learn more about it to create a framework for developers on how to implement contract testing in BOC projects.
The tasks I did consisted in documenting how contract testing works with more advanced research on various topics, implementing new tests (developed in Javascript), integrating them in the existing CI pipelines and sharing the knowledge gained to the other people in BOC who might be interested too.”
What were the main challenges you faced during these six months? How did you manage them?
“During these three months, the main challenge I faced was discovering and using new tools. This included applications, technologies, and work methods that I had never used before, especially since it was my first working experience. I also started working on a subject I had never studied before, which required not only acquiring new theoretical knowledge about contract testing but also applying it for BOC projects.
To manage these challenges, I started by quickly familiarizing myself with the resources available, such as the BOC documentation, online tutorials and the official documentation of the tools used. I also received help from my colleagues whenever I needed it. By practicing and working on concrete examples, I felt more comfortable with these new tools and was able to improve my skills more quickly.”
How did you benefit from your studies during your internship?
“My studies at the Ecole Centrale de Lyon taught me to be polyvalent and to adapt easily to new topics. I’m studying general engineering, which means that I had courses on many different fields related to engineering (computer science but also mechanics, energy, electronics, materials, signals…), so we get used to learning about new topics. And I think this was very useful for my internship because even though I had basic programming skills, I had never worked on tests before or with CI/CD infrastructures, so I discovered all of this when I arrived. Indeed, DevOps methods are not really what we learn at school, since we don’t need them for small projects, so I didn’t really use the direct knowledge I acquired during my studies. In addition, I gave presentations to show the progress of our research on contract testing. This is something I’m used to doing as part of my studies, so I also benefited from it.”
Which skills and qualifications helped you most during your time abroad?
“Communication skills in English were particularly useful, because it’s the language used to communicate with colleagues and, even if I don’t speak German, English was enough to navigate daily life. Adaptability was also very helpful. I arrived in a new country, in a new working environment, and I managed to quickly adjust to all these changes. The great atmosphere at BOC probably also helped me for this smooth transition.”
What would you tell your friends and colleagues about your time at BOC Group?
“My three months at BOC went by very fast. I really enjoyed my time here, I felt integrated into the team and everyone in the company was very nice.
It was an excellent experience for me. I have learned a lot and all the knowledge and skills acquired will be useful for my future. It has greatly enriched my professional and personal development and I will only keep good memories from my time at BOC Group.”
