Journey of a graduate @ Tesco Technology

Journey of a graduate @ Tesco Technology

Mohit Malpani

Software Development Engineer

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Journey of a graduate @ Tesco Technology

May 19, 2020 902 Views

Hello, I am Mohit Malpani, a Software Development Engineer-II at Tesco Bengaluru.

I joined Tesco four years ago as a graduate and quickly transitioned into my role, working on a challenging project with some great colleagues!

My team was responsible for designing a new customer-facing mobile application on iOS and Android for millions of our customers spread across the UK, Thailand and Malaysia shopping online via Tesco Groceries.

Being new to Android application development, I initially found some of the technical jargon quite overwhelming, and I was concerned that the journey ahead was going to be tough. However, my team made it easy for me to learn on the job and build my confidence.

Learning at Tesco…

I get to learn something new every single day that I come to work at Tesco. We have unlimited access to Pluralsight and Safari Books. Our internal experts are also generous with sharing their knowledge.

The leaders at Tesco encourage us to keep ourselves updated with technology. We can choose to run PoCs on new tools, frameworks and tech stack to find the best ways to solve problems. For example, we needed to integrate an Analytics tool into our application and had to choose between two market-leading tools. We developed an evaluation methodology to make the decision, starting with objectively comparing the relevant functionalities that would help us gather the best metrics to improve customer experience. Every team member’s view was considered, and, in the process, we learned how to make a tech decision ourselves instead of depending on our team leader to do so.

IGNITE, the annual Tesco Technology event is a forum to hear from Technology leaders about the achievements of the past year, and the exciting things to look forward to in the next. We also gain insights from experts from diverse fields on the broad impact of Technology in communities around the world. One such example was a talk on how Artificial Intelligence helped save the lives of potentially cancer-prone women in India. In the run-up to the event, Tesco also hosts technical sessions showcasing the innovative application of technology such as Virtual Reality and Analytics in the retail world.

Impact of my work…

Being an Android App developer, my focus is on designing and developing applications that enable a great shopping experience for our customers. Collaboration with our fantastic design team helped us transform UI / UX phenomenally to help our customers shop faster and more easily. We ensure that our applications are secure and safe to use at scale by focusing on data security so that customers can shop confidently knowing their privacy is taken care of.

We hold ourselves to high standards of digital accessibility and enable localisation in our apps for our international customers. We have features including dynamic font size, support for an appropriate theme for the home country, and an option to switch to a local language such as Thai, Hungarian, or Polish. This is one of the most used features by our users.

What is Tesco Culture like…

I have found Tesco colleagues to be approachable and friendly. Whenever I have reached out to someone for guidance, the response has been positive. This has motivated me to do my best to create better products and services. My colleagues go the extra mile for me, and I go the extra mile for the customer. I experience our Core Value of ‘Every Little Helps’ every single day and pay it forward because the giving culture is woven into the fabric of the organization.