Amazon Internship Experience (Received PPO)

I will start by saying the learning curve I had in the past 2 months is just exponential. I could not have asked for a better learning experience. So my internship started on 6th June 2022 and finally I had my first step into the corporate world in the Amazon Hyderabad office. The first few days I spent bonding with my team members, setting up my laptop, and understanding my project which I think is very important because it will help you in the longer run.

Not going into the details of my project but the tech stack required was Java SpringBoot, React JS, and Redux. I will suggest anyone who is going to join Amazon have a basic understanding of Java Frameworks such as SpringBoot, Juice, and React because it is very likely that the team you will land into will be using these technologies. Apart from this, I got to work on various AWS Technologies like AWS Lambda, Dynamo DB, and Simple Notification Service. I never really worked with all of those before which is why it was quite challenging for me at the start but thankfully I had the best team and the best mentors who guided me throughout and I was able to implement them on my own.

Tips for your Internship as of my experience:

• Always be in touch with your mentor:

Make sure you are in close communication with your mentor as they are a primary point of contact between you and your manager and they can guide you to learn things faster. It can very overwhelming especially for 2 months intern to learn so much in a short span but with the right mentor, it becomes a lot easy.

• Think Big, Think out of simple lines of code:

This is I believe the best thing I learned after coming here but make sure you have this in mind before you join. Give ideas that may sound bizarre to others but are out of the box. Do not restrict yourself from trying to implement something that has never been done. This will show that you are more than just an engineer who can write hundreds of lines of code but also a problem solver, a thinker.

• Document everything from the start:

My mentor advised me to do so and thankfully I did and it helped me so much during the end of my internship. Have a document that you can update weekly about the tasks you have done, what you have learned, what are you trying to achieve, the challenges you faced, and other things that might be relevant to you. You might not realize its importance at the start but finally at the end of the internship when you have to submit your review document it will help you a lot and you will not miss any important points.

• Don’t stress about Conversion:

I can't stress how important it is to not stress about the conversion. I was in a conversation with an SDE 2 at Amazon and he told me “As much as you want Amazon, Amazon wants you” believe me after listening to this it helped me realize how true it is. My Hyderabad office was so much fun and me and my team went to play cricket, Table Tennis, Foosball almost daily now that I am writing it I miss all of it and can’t wait to meet my team again!

Focus more on learning and PPO will follow up.

• Try to understand your part of the project, there will be a huge code base:

Everything takes time and it is not possible for an intern to go through thousands of packages, huge code base and all the terminology used in Amazon. This was one of the mistake I did when I joined and it overwhelmed to a great extent but as time passed I realised I should have a deep understanding of my part as of now and not get overwhelmed.

• Give at least a week to your final presentation:

There will me various subteams in your team so try to give frequent presentations to the members that do not have a deep undersatnding of your projects so that you will get to know how much you know about the project and how confident you are while answering their questions. Keep asking for feedback and try to be a team player. Your mentors will be there to help you out in case you are not sure about some questions so do not worry! Even the team knows we are interns so there are not a lot of expectations just have a clear understanding and be confident in whatever you say.

• Have frequent sync ups and 1:1 with your manager

Your manager will present your case finally and will play a very importamt role to decide weather you should be converted or not. Know what are their expectations from you and always try to exceed them.

• JUSK ASK!

This is one of the most important principle followed in Amazon so basically if you are stuck somewhere try first if you can get to a solution yiurself but don’t fear to ask in case you are stuck for a long time. I cannot stress on how important this is and you will be amazed to see how helpful are people here. Everyopne is so down to earth and helpful here.

Lastly I would like to say if you have received the Internship you are already on the right track congragulations for that! Try to talk to your team members, be humble, always have a learning attitude and you are good to go! Also if you are joining Hyderabad office do not forget to come say Hi to me I will be really happy to see you!

I will keep adding any more points that come to my mind bye :)