What's your job about?
BNZ aims to be more than just a bank by supporting communities and creating sustainable practices.
In my role, I support the cloud infrastructure to help our team move towards this goal.
My role consists of creating and maintaining environments in which other developers in the bank can deploy their applications and software. I am in the graduate program, meaning I rotate around the different cloud teams (Azure, AWS, and Containers), and I am starting out with Azure.
The cloud can help the bank both save time and money and use fewer resources, meaning more can be put towards where it is needed. To do this, it needs to be used correctly, so my team and I work to make sure the security, uptime, and shared knowledge are of the highest standard.
In my everyday work, I create and update features to make adoption and usage of the cloud easier, help developers solve questions or issues with their cloud environments, and make sure the BNZ environment in the cloud is kept safe. My favorite part is creating new features which I recently did when I helped develop a system that cuts time to access an Azure virtual machine from a working day to around 1-2 hours. Most of the delay was in the approval system, so finding a way to create a pre-approved group and automatically add new machines into it was very exciting as that was a large bottleneck for users wanting to continue with their work.
What's your background?
I was born, and currently live in New Plymouth, Taranaki, where, after finishing high school at New Plymouth Boys’ High, I took on a role as a sales consultant at Noel Leeming. This taught me a lot of communication skills, which I am still grateful for today, as I was a shy kid and had to leave my comfort zone to talk to new people every day.
After a few years, I was offered a technician role due to my love and proficiency with technology, Though I enjoyed this role, I always knew I wanted to advance my knowledge. When the first COVID-19 lockdown occurred in 2020, I had plenty of time to think. I decided, with the support of my partner, to study full-time, which was the best decision I could have made.
I learned a lot through my courses and was introduced to Summer of Tech internships, which I applied to, hoping I would get some useful experience. When the meet-and-greet interviews came around, I joined one for the BNZ cloud platform. I was so impressed with their welcoming nature; I went to a second group interview for the same role just to learn more!
I made it through further interviews with them and found we were a good fit, so I got the offer to become an intern for three months over the 2021–2022 summer. I got an incredible amount out of it while feeling valued and supported, so I was excited to learn about my offer to work permanently, which I promptly accepted and am absolutely loving!
Could someone with a different background do your job?
Absolutely! Not because it is easy, but because BNZ gives the support and tools to allow people to learn and grow in the field they want. You become an asset to BNZ the more you know, so furthering that knowledge is in everyone’s best interest. For most of my job, I have learned through doing rather than studying, so the only criteria you need to be successful in my role are a willingness to learn, a passion for technology, honesty, and humility in making mistakes that you can learn from rather than giving up.
What's the coolest thing about your job?
The coolest part of my job is being able to see the effort I have invested in the way other teams work. When I can make something easier, safer, or more useful, I feel proud, which pushes me to do more.
I also love how dynamic the role is. One moment I might be scripting a new feature in PowerShell, bash, or Python, the next training or consulting customers on how to use our services, and other times we get to put our detective hats on and find issues or bugs, which is an awesome feeling when we can find and fix the issue.
What are the limitations of your job?
One obvious limitation of working in tech is that you will spend a lot of time looking at a computer screen. Sometimes your eyes may get strained, so make sure to take regular breaks! There is also a lot of problem-solving, and you will get stuck for long periods of time, so if that sounds frustrating, I wouldn’t get into this role.
Another limitation is that you won’t always be working on exciting projects, sometimes you just have to update/create documentation or sit in on long planning meetings. These are necessary, however, to continue to work on the things you enjoy!
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