From TCS to Amazon😳 DevOps Journey in 1 Year | Cloud Support Engineer Story | DEVOPS + CLOUD ROADMAP

I welcome Preetam to today's session. So, this So, this is going to be a very exciting one. Just uh As you informed that you got selected in Amazon as cloud support engineer, right? Yeah. So, this is going to be a very exciting session. I'm very glad that you can make time today for joining with us. And yeah, thank you again for coming in. Yeah, sir. So, this session is just going to be a general chit-chat on what your life's journey has been so far. It's going to be inspiring for a lot of different people. Especially the freshers, for people who have got lesser amount of experience. And your journey to Amazon, what you did, where your learning started, so that it can inspire a lot of different people. So, Preetam, tell me about yourself. So, what are you doing at the moment? Where are you? What has been your journey so far? Where did it you did college? What inspired you for DevOps? So, tell me about yourself. Yeah, so my name is Preetam Salunkhe. So, I'm born and brought up in like North Maharashtra, Jalgaon. So, I'm basically from Jalgaon. And I completed my engineering in Pune from Pune University, Sinhgad Institutes, Pune University. So, after completing my engineering like from since like college itself, I got placed into TCS. So, just after graduating, I started working with TCS. So, since college days, I had like interest about cloud and like I haven't heard about DevOps back then, but cloud and all I have heard. So, I did my Azure Fundamentals certification. So, there was like some promotion going on, so there were like three vouchers for the Azure certification. So, I did Azure Fundamentals back then. So, then I started working in TCS. So, in TCS, my role was Java developer. So, it was not related to cloud. So, after like getting into like after working for few days, I started exploring like options because the thing was like the office in which I was sitting, the person to my right was also preparing to be a Java developer. He was learning Spring Boot. The person to my left like he was also preparing to the front. Like everyone whole team was preparing Java Java. Like all the freshers were doing Java Java. So, I thought that there should be something different to get out of the competition. So, I thought that we should learn more new skills. So, I started exploring. So, I started searching on YouTube. So, the like I got your videos like your mock interview videos. So, that really got me like interested into your platform like Cloud and DevOps and Cloud Labs. So, Yeah. So, I started with it started with the mentorship, took that decision like one of with one of my friend that we should start with the mentorship. Then once got into the mentorship program, then started learning things one by one like connected with you over one-on-one calls and like got like you set targets like you need to get certified into like this three cert doing that. So, did my like Cloud Practitioner certification, then did my Solutions Architect. So, in like 1 month or 2 months gap, I was doing one certification, preparing on them, practicing like practice test, and then appearing for the exam, and then clearing them. So, did Developer Associate, then also did GitHub Actions. Side by side, I was also doing like some hands-on. I created uh free credits from AWS. So, I was doing some hands-on over there. Also did some projects like basic ones like CI/CD. And as well as like every weekend session used to also happen. So, I was learning from that also. So, yeah. That's it. Great, Preetam. So, so you have been a student of our mentorship program and you have been quite active in it as well. Before the mentorship, what steps did you take to learn DevOps? So, how were you progressing with that? Okay. So, before mentorship also, I was like trying out using some few like YouTube videos or like few courses also I have explored. Like one of my friend bought one course, so I took like access from it and I tried watching it.

But they were mostly like just they were commands and they were just copy-paste that not explaining a lot like what's going on behind them. They were just copy-pasting lot of videos. So, I was facing difficulty in that. So, yeah. That's what like helped in mentorship like little bit dive deep and also like whatever doubt I had, I can just ask. So, that's what Yeah. So, we in mentorship also we go through a lot of different assignments. And for people who do not know about it, so there are weekly assignments and all. Did you try attempting to those assignments and learning on the paths that was recommended in the mentorship program? Yeah, I have like the first one itself was like after completing the DevOps basic like boot camp, there was one a assignment for pet clinic project to like completely deploy the CI/CD for the pet clinic project. So, I tried that. And yeah, I have completed it. Yeah. Right. Now, I often say that there are multiple ways in which a DevOps career can progress. So, it can be towards DevOps engineer, towards cloud support engineer. You can reach towards the cloud architecture. So, did you have any preference on working towards CI/CD or more towards Kubernetes or managing a platform? Did you have any sort of preference to that? So, did you like programming more than scripting or did you like managing containers the infrastructure? So, did you have any sort of preference in that? I haven't like thought of as such like now like what should I have preference because I don't have like expertise over one thing. Like I have just like started learning about this all of these things. So, I haven't got expertise in any one of them. So, yeah, I'll just let's see like how it goes. If I found interest in any one of them, then definitely I'll be like try to get into one specific niche. Yeah. Cool. And you said you have got what's the total number of years of experience that you have? I joined in August 2023. So, like now I'll be completing 10 months next like next August I'll be completing Less than a year of experience. And so, now you have cracked Amazon. So, you are very well done. So, and when you told me that you got into it, I was really happy about it. So, we did an interview preparation for Amazon as well. I think before this video is released, we'll be releasing your interview video as well on YouTube. So, many people can start learning on it. And I'm very pleased that you got into it. I was very confident that you will actually get into Amazon. Now, tell me about what happened on the day of interview because that is going to be a very inspiring for a lot of people. So, how did you dress up for Amazon? So, were you on a like a suit or tie or were you like wearing shorts and chappals? No, no, no. They like they clearly mentioned in the like invitation itself that there's no need to like dress up formally. You can just dress up normal. So, yeah, I was just wearing a normal shirt. And that's it. The interview was virtual online. So, like no dress up was needed. So, I just I was wearing yeah. Yeah, just a shirt. In TCS, in an office They have strict policy for formal. So, right now where I'm working, I need to go in formals every day. Like shirt and yeah, all of that. Okay. So, you're going to office every day in TCS at the moment. — Yeah, yeah. TCS, it has like every day in office like 5 days office policy. So, yeah, every day need to go to office. Okay. And did they tell you in Amazon is it going to be like a Yeah, they told it's going to be remote. Just you need to be present at the base location. Whatever base location is there, you need to be present there, but it will be completely remote. Okay. And are you happy about that? Yeah, yeah. So, that was my main goal. Like actually to be saying because 5 days office is very difficult like staying away from your family and friends. And like you know that this work can be done from home, but still you need to go to office. And then you connect over teams to do the same work with someone. So, you like it's frustrating. So, yeah. Yeah, that that is true. I think a work from home is one of the aspects which came out of the COVID that we had. Uh But though it was very unfortunate that we had the COVID and all, but it was one of the blessings that came out that proved that the guys can work from home and continuously and provide a lot of input.

input. Yeah. All right. So, now regarding your Amazon, so tell us about the interview day. So, how many interviews did you go through? Uh How many ways So, were these interviews scheduled beforehand or was it like you complete one round and then it the next round would be scheduled? Yeah, so I'll just start from the like the start of it. So, uh basically what happened I used to continuously check my like Naukri profile update on it. So, uh whatever projects I did in our lab and also whatever like uh hands-on I did I used to present over the resume and also the certifications and the links in a like well-structured format. So, uh I used to upload update that resume in Naukri. So, I got invite from the recruiter from the Amazon itself uh to like to appear like to apply for the position like they found my profile suitable. So, first uh like uh when I got that uh invite I was like uh little bit uh hesitant to apply. So, I was thinking like uh it's Amazon and I'll not be able to crack it and I'll just waste my chance because if we apply once then there will be some cool-off period. So, I was thinking that when I'll get prepared I'll apply. So, I just shared that link with one of my friend. So, he got excited and he applied. So, he applied and he got the test link. So, I thought that now I should also apply. So, I also applied and got the test link. So, uh gave the test. So, there was one uh like online test. It was mainly like uh a situation-based like uh suppose there are like uh few different customers then uh to whom first you'll prioritize like whose problem you'll solve based on the situation presented over there. Then there were like technical question. Uh there were like uh among like multiple topics you had to choose three topics. So, I chose like Linux, networking, and whoops. So, uh MCQs were there uh from these topics. So, after like completing this uh test in like two to three days I got feedback that yeah we are positive and uh this is the like invitation for the link. So, generally they gave they give like 10 days. So, I got 10 days like after 10 days my interview was scheduled. So, interview was on like weekend like Saturday. So, I started preparing. I just like uh gave some applied for that the day I received interview invitation I applied for casual leaves as soon as possible. So, I also gave some sick leaves and then started preparing for the role. So, mainly the like whatever was uh like expected in interview was given in the invitation mail itself that what like what will be the topics. So, uh there were three rounds. So, first was the uh operating system. Uh so, in that there were like choice uh like if you want to choose Linux or Windows and then uh like uh questions will be based on that and also like basic operating systems. So, I chose like Linux. So, it revolved around basic operating system concepts like uh uh say like a deadlock or like how uh how a Linux uh booting like how a Linux system boots or how operating system boots. Uh then like different storage types or what's the difference between SSD and uh hard drives. Then what is like what's the difference between RAM and hard drives. So, yeah it was just uh like that and also like Linux concepts. And also in that round uh programming round was also there. So, they just asked me to screen share and solve one of the like uh basic programming question like something like reverse a string or like valid palindrome. So, in that uh way uh the first round was there and like all three rounds were elimination rounds. So, after clearing first there was second then after clearing second there was third. So, second was networking round. So, it was all about like uh computer networking, uh different protocols, OSI models, and TCP UDP difference between them. Then uh what would happen when you enter like google. com in the browser. So, who will like process, handshakes, DNS resolution. So, it was related to all the like basic computer networking. Uh and yeah, so that's it. So, and the third round was the behavioral round. So, it was non-technical round. It was mainly about like your resume discussion then your uh like if you have previous experience then about that. Then there were different situations presented and you had to answer them in the STAR format. So, there were like uh tell me a time when you went above and beyond for a customer. Then yeah, in that way there were behavioral questions. So, each round were was of 45 minutes. And there were some gap and all the rounds were in a single day. So, that's it about the interview day.

So, it was like good experience. Uh the feedback was like very quick. Uh once the interview is done in 5 to 10 minutes HR would call you and tell you if it's positive or negative. Mhm. That's the way it took place. Cool. And so, any key challenges that you faced during the interview? Any difficult questions that you had to encounter? Yeah, sometimes they like they went little deep into the topic. So, uh yeah and uh so, there were my there like my preparation lacked a little bit. So, one question I was asked is I think what is thrashing. So, I was not able to answer that. So, afterwards I like I looked up it. And for those questions that you were not sure of, would you tell them uh beforehand itself that I'm not really sure or did you attempt to tell them or Yeah, I I like if if it was completely new to me I told them that yeah I I don't know about this. I'll definitely look about it. And if it I if it's somewhat relative then whatever I know of it I'll tell that. So, that's what approach I like followed. Cool. All right. So, I think uh So, tell us uh about uh the mentorship. So, how important do you think mentorship is in uh is important for a professional growth? Yeah, mentorship can be like really helpful. So, the first thing that uh like really helped me a lot is the accountability. So, if we prepare on our own there is no sort of like metrics to follow that I'm like we will be like in like in our own way we'll do it like in one month we'll cover a lot of topics and then in next month we'll do nothing. So, in that way it can be. But due to mentorship there will be like uh accountability. Like there will be someone who will be asking us like we'll be presenting, we'll be telling that yeah this week I have completed this. They also there will be networking. So, I connected with lot of folks like uh in our mentorship program there were like Swati and lot of other people were there. So, I connected over them like they have not they have now become like good friends. So, created groups with them. We started uh connecting on our own. We started taking like uh meetings like on our own like doing hands-on. So, that will also help like uh good network and also like consistency. Every weekend there will be session. But if you try to like do something on your own every uh like on a daily basis then you will like fail to be consistent. But as like a group will do so uh it will it would help you to be consistent. Also assignments would be there. So, assignments will also help. Mock interviews will help. So, like uh I booked uh mock interview with you just a day before my interview. So, that boosted uh confidence like lot of uh confidence boost was because of that because exact same interview uh happened after that because like I gave you all the topics and all like the job description. So, whatever questions you asked like mostly like I can say 30 40 questions were similar and also the experience uh helped like uh doing that uh again once. So, it helped a lot. Uh I'm very glad that it helped. So, your mock interview was very good as well. So, and uh I'm I'm really pleased uh that you got into Amazon. I was pretty hopeful when you gave the mock interview too. So, I think many of our subscribers will benefit from that interview too. Yeah. And uh Yes, funny you mentioned Swati because Swati also got a new job just last week. Uh I think she's in UK or US I think uh I think she got in UK. Yeah, so So, I think the students are doing very well. And uh even Ratnadeep uh your friend uh who got into Amazon too. I think his video will be released might have been released by the time we'll share this. Yeah. Cool. Uh all right, Preetam. Uh just I wanted to share you share uh Yeah, so just keep continuing in the mentorship program. I'm pretty sure that you will still learn a lot of things. Yes. Cuz there are a lot of experience-based learnings uh which you can elevate your knowledge to far ahead than whatever others can imagine it to be. So, Mhm. Yeah. myself Sanjeev and Avinash we continue to dive into a lot of different domain experiences. And uh so, I'll continue to see you in the mentorship program again. So, All the best for your journey and yeah, Amazon. I'm pretty sure you'll have a very successful career. Yeah. Thank you. Thanks for your time today, Preetam. I'll see you again. Yeah, thank you. All right. See you. — Mhm.