Making people's lives easier.

What is the main purpose of your role?

For me that’s having a positive impact on people’s lives. In cloud native engineering we focus on automations. On continuously improving and integrating new tools. All based on feedback from consumers and customers.

Our job is to help the tech teams adopt new solutions very smoothly. And ING provides all the latest technologies that you want to work with. That helps us advance and add value to our lives. Because without tech, nothing will work.

What makes you love your job?

First of all, I love what I’m doing. And then there is the healthy work environment. The work-life balance is very good here in Belgium. Better than anything I experienced before. And I have a very good team where I can give my individual opinion and where we exchange ideas. Which is adding value to my personal growth.

It’s a very collaborative and welcoming culture. Very diversified as well. Everytime I enter the ING offices, people smile at me. I don’t feel like an outsider because I come from another country. They treat me as one of their own. Which helps me to connect with them.

Do you have to be a nerd or a geek to work in tech?

You just need to have the right ideas at the right time and be able to solve complex problems in a simple way. That’s it. The people in my team have 5 to 10 years of experience. Some even more. Everybody has their own set of ideas. Based on their own background, lifestyle and personality.

We work agile, with a lot of sprints. That means we discuss and figure out the best answer. We know what to do and when our deadlines are. Then we decide how and when we do it. Management doesn’t tell you what to do. You have your own freedom and discipline.

Is tech a man’s world?

Not at ING. My manager always says to me, Adyasha, always do things that inspire others. You should be yourself at work, speak up, … You know, this is really a fun environment where everyone enjoys spending time together.

Recently I joined the tech party. With drinks, good food, we danced … Even outside of your work, people are equal. They interact with you, share their experiences, as a family. Because why would you behave differently inside and outside of the office?

Is tech just about building new features?

To me, tech is about making complex things simpler. That’s what we are designing for. So that the consumer will feel “oh, that’s so easy”. Making people’s lives easier, like I said. Based on the latest technologies around.

We are gradually replacing older tools that have no advantage anymore, with newer ones. Cloud native engineering and web based development are very popular over here. Also Java 2022 is a reality at ING, just to give you a few examples.

How have you evolved in your first months with ING?

My job is to look for opportunities to automate. To stay in touch with the evolving technology, we do a lot of research. If we hear about another technology that might be interesting, we investigate it and look for ways to integrate it.

Recently I held a talk during the town hall. In front of 200 people and 300 online. I was speaking about what I’m working on. And I was inspiring them to use our solution. I got to share my experiences so they could use it. That’s me evolving in just 6 months. I hope there will be many more opportunities like these to come.