Student story - Gaukhar Massabayeva
Are you one of the millions of people with an Xbox 360? If you are using it only for games, you’re missing out! ‘Xbox LIVE’ can give you state of the art media functionality, transforming your living room into a cinema or a stadium and your TV into a jukebox or a photo album.
Pretty cool but it’s not actually magic – engineers and computer scientists have been working behind the scenes on the software driving it all. Gaukhar Massabayeva became part of that team when she did her placement year at Microsoft. This is her story:
“My role at Microsoft was a Software Development Engineer in Test working on Xbox TV application platforms. I found my role extremely satisfying as it allowed me to learn an extensive range of programming languages as well as principles and practices of good software engineering. Only knowing basic code writing I’d done at university, I was not prepared for how different things would be in the real world of software development. Real customers, real milestones and uncompromising demand for a quality of the product. These were every day challenges I faced at Microsoft.
I remember my first day at Microsoft with my new colleagues, listening to them talking about a lot of things I had never heard about. I was also aware of a huge knowledge gap between the previous placement student who was just finishing and myself. At first I thought that was because my degree was Electronic and Computer Systems Engineering, so him studying Computer Science accounted for the difference. I was not convinced I could learn this vast amount of programming techniques but I’ve proved myself wrong! As I continued learning more and more about my job I realized that difference between us was the time he’d spent at Microsoft learning from colleagues and working hard to overcome challenges our manager put forward for him. Now it was my turn!
Working for Microsoft is both hard and very easy. 
Challenges are tough but with help and guidance they are not impossible and it is often the case that people who wrote an application work in the same building as you and you can easily approach that person directly and ask: hey, how does this work?
Another of the benefits of working for one of the biggest software corporations was easy access to learning and tools resources such as free MSDN subscription and SharePoint sites that have a range of software any Software Engineer would find invaluable. I was provided with all means possible to learn how to do my job well. From a library full of books on any work related subject to regular 1-2-1 sessions with my manager on what it was I'm particularly good at, what needed improving and how to achieve that improvement.
It took me a lot of work, commitment and motivation to get to my present skill level and to learn how to do my job efficiently. It meant staying extra hours trying to figure out how to write an application that would allow me to do my job more efficiently.
And there were never-ending opportunities. The perks of working for Microsoft as a student are numerous and the extra activities on offer were brilliant. I myself was a part of an “evangelists team”, in other words I made presentations about Microsoft technology to young students like myself, and to partners and developers. I found it great fun and an excellent way to learn soft skills and networking.
Volunteering was strongly encouraged at Microsoft and I took part in company events to inspire young girls to be brave and take more interest in technology. I also found myself running a 5K race for the NSPCC charity – dressed as a TV - that's me on the left! It was a fantastic experience and one of the many things I am proud of from my placement year.
Now that it is coming to an end, I can’t believe how quickly it went and how much I have learned. To be honest I wish I could stay and work at Microsoft instead of going back to University, but I need to finish my degree. My placement has given me career options in either engineering or computer science so I am really looking forward to choosing where I want to work next.
And now my CV has this very important section: Work Experience – Student Intern at Microsoft, 2010 – 2011.
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