Ziyi has great memories of studying at Sheffield, even pulling the all nighters!

Student outside taking a photo with their mobile phone
Ziyi Jiang
Senior Software Engineer (IBM)
MSc Advanced Computer Science
2016
Since graduating Ziyi has been working as a Senior Software Engineer for IBM

What are your main responsibilities?
Developing and delivering a solution to meet customer requirements.


Can you describe a typical day?
We start with daily meeting where we talk about what should we need to do, then we all go off and do it. For me, mostly it would be UI development or devOps.


What is the most rewarding aspect of your current role or your greatest achievement so far?
Helping our biggest customer to fix a bug which had been a long term problem. Because of the successful delivery, I received a Manager Choice Award. 


Are there any challenging aspects? If so what are they?
I have to keep learning new things to meet the new asset requirement in many different areas, for me it is learning UI development and devOps.


What skills/qualifications from your degree or other training do you make use of in your job?
The skills of solving a problem, and the basic technology we use. A good example is because of the Computer Graphic and Virtual Reality module I can help our team to make decisions when they are trying to use Augmented Reality or Virtual Reality to solve a problem. 


Why did you choose to study at Sheffield?
The students' satisfaction with school is very high and they always say that the city is built for school :)


What were the best things about studying in the Department?
Being able to borrow devices for testing our work and the fact that there are many genius' in the Department. 
The staff are also very helpful. When I was doing my dissertation project I had a hard time learning to use the Kinect (which I had never used before). My supervisor and my classmates helped me. I'll never forget those all-nighters. Everything is lovely in my memory!


Where do you see yourself in the future?
One day I hop to start my own company.


If you could give one piece of advice to current students or recent graduates what would it be?
What you have to remember is not what you have been told in the school, it is learning the ability and skills to solve the problem.

Four students laughing while sat at a bench, outside the Students' Union

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