My PEY internship officially started May 7, 2009.  This coming Sunday marks the end of my first month!  Fifteen more months to go!  It feels as if the first few weeks just flew by, but I have to admit, I’m still pretty lost in terms of where I stand in the team, and where our team stands in terms of software development and IBM as a whole.  Now let me try to sum up what I remember doing for the first 4 weeks.

Week 1:  Orientation

We started work on a Thursday, and half of that day was orientation.  A little more than a hundred students sat in the Amphitheatre listening to a series of presentations one followed by another.  After that, we were split into 3 groups and each group alternated in getting a tour of the building, getting a tour of our gym, and getting our photos taken for our badges.  The rest of the Thursday afternoon and Friday, I mainly spent reading DB2 material, meeting the people I’ll be working with, and familiarizing myself with the building.

Week 2:  Getting Started

By the end of the first week, I already started configuring my desktop at work.  The rest of this second week also consisted of some installations here and there.  I still spent most of my time reading about DB2 though.  The most exciting thing about the second week was the fact that I finally got exposed to something UX related.  Read the rest of this entry »

I should really get into the habit of blogging about events right after they happen.  But I suppose it’s better late than never. :)

A few weeks ago, I officially accepted the IBM User-Centered Design Specialist offer as my 16-month internship for the Professional Experience Year (PEY) program offered at the University of Toronto.  I spent a lot of time thinking about the position, and I also spoke to a lot people to get some advice as to which offer I should take.  I had a few offers to choose from (luckily): a few IBM positions (1 of which was this UX position; others were generally software development related positions), and other offers from various other companies and organizations.  The two offers that I was mainly deciding between were this UX position at IBM, and a software developer position at Intelliware.

This was a big decision to make, and there were so many aspects to take into consideration.  For example, I was thinking about the position (and whether or not I would like to pursue in that direction upon graduation), travelling (will I have to spend approximately another 3 hours on the TTC every day?), the people I will be working with, the projects that I may potentially work on…etc.  But I finally decided to take the UX position at IBM.

Read the rest of this entry »