1- Erasmus Exchange

Erasmus is an European Union supported exchange programme. For one semester or for one academic year students go abroad to study there. EU is paying students some scholarship, which is quite enough to live. All the ask for is to success your lectures, even not all the lectures, just some percent of them is enough.

Erasmus was one of the best experiences I’ve ever had till today. I started to stand on my own feet. I learned to keep my budget. I learned to properly cook, clean, iron etc. all by myself. I learned about Italian culture, (some German culture also). I taste different foods, experienced different teaching methods, learned new languages, got new friends, saw too many cities with little money. And became a confident, self-aware guy.

In Turkey, you need a GPA and also you need to pass some exams to participate in Erasmus programme. My advice is, whatever it takes for you participate in Erasmus exchange.

Erasmus really changed my life, and the way I see the life. I feel more open-minded, more independent, more welcoming now. And it is too hard to stay in a place for a long time without traveling now.

2- Part-time work or long-term internship

Having a part-time job or a long-term internship will make you more experienced. especially a work in the branch that you want to become professional will be a good choice.

You will taste making money, you will become less dependent to your family.

You will start building your network. You will learn the difference between university life, university projects and the real life, real projects.

You will have some experience to write on your CV. And probably you’ll get your first job, if you are lucky and hard working enough.

3- Join student clubs & organizations

Students clubs & organizations will improve your network and soft skills. I got most of my non-IT friends thanks to student organizations. I’ve been in two different student clubs through my university life, the first one is EHAVK (Ege University Aviation Association Paragliding Team). I’ve been in this association for 5 years. I started my journey from the base to the top. From beginner pilot to instructor & tandem pilot. This association taught me about organizing events, leading a group, instructing to people, team work, presentation skills.

My second association was AIESEC. I’ve only stayed for one year in AIESEC, but it improved me alot. Because it gave me lots of responsbilities, I had the roles of Project Manager and Communication Responsible of Local Committee. I was leading a team of 3 persons. We were organising events, recruiting new members, publishing newsletter, keeping our website updated, participating in weekly meetings. It taught me a lot.

Being a member of student associations will teach you lots of things, improve your network, let you improve yourself in every manner. Try it.

4- Go to events

One of my regrets about my university life. I’ve begun attending to events in my job life. But there is never enough time to participate in the events I want.

Attending to events will let you enlarge your network, stay updated about your professions matters and development. My suggestion for IT sector is to attend events like hackathons, Google Developer Group events, hackerspaces/makerspaces and vendor events.

5- Chose graduation project / thesis wisely

Another regret for me.

Your project/thesis will effect your job. It will effect your chance of getting selected for jobs and Master/PhD programmes. Choose your thesis/project on your branch, make contribution to this area.

6- Have fun

  Study hard, work harder but have fun even harder. It was our motto in AIESEC “Work hard, party harder.” It is one of the best  proverbs I’ve ever heard. Party hard, have fun hard, enjoy your university and social life while you can.

Keep in mind that these days will not come back. And there is another thing, every person I met says they were richer when      they were students. Some how it is true. I was not earning money like I am doing today. But I was living a better life. Also I had much more time for everything.

While you still have time and money, enjoy your life. Get out with friends, get crazy.

7- Move out

I also suggest you to move out if you can. Leaving without your parents  will teach you so much. You will learn to plan a budget, being tidy, cooking, cleaning, washing, ironing etc etc. You will stand on your own feet. You will face with bitter truth of bills, rent, house maintenance etc. But you’ll grow up by handling them. You’ll get mature.

That’s all from me. Thanks for reading.
Share, comment, join conversation.

Hello and happy new year to all,

I wanted to sum up my year:

4000+ visitors in blog,
5200+ views in blog,
12 new posts in blog,
3+ projects completed,
1 new job,
New friends, new colleagues…

Happy new year!

Nowadays I hear a lot complains about my generation: Generation Y. People say it is hard to keep us happy. We become upset quickly, we expect too much etc. etc. So in this post I will try to focus on this topic with an internal view.

Generations

Let’s look at the “generations” closer. Scientist divided human race to generations, they’re separated by birth years and every group has common thought and behavior which differs from other generations.

When we check the generation list of western world (America, Europe) from Wikipedia we can see the list below:

• Lost Generation (1883 – 1900): Who fought in WWI.
• Greatest Generation (1901 – 1924): Who fought in WWII.
• Silent Generation (1925 – 1942): Who fought in Korean and Vietnam wars.
• Baby Boomers (1943 – 1960): Generation born after WWII is finished.
• Generation X (1960 – 1980)
• Generation Y (1980 – 2000)
• Generation Z (2001 – …)

Last three generation does not have any distinctive historic event, they only have date intervals given by demographers. But I will write some common behaviors for these three generations depending on my observations in my home country, Turkey.

Generation X members are mostly have a stable professional life. Most wanted jobs are civil servant, branch manager in a bank or officer in army. They are hardworking in the sense of body power. For sure they are not lazy but they afraid of changes. They’ve seen military interventions in 70’s and 80’s. So they want a guaranteed lifestyle. They start to work in somewhere and usually get retired from the same organization.

Generation Y is the main topic of this post so I will have a detailed text below about them and their professional life.

Generation Z members are still in high school or in college. They were born into technology. They are mostly lazy because of “smart” devices. They are getting less social and more connected day by day. I wonder about their professional lives.

So, what Generation Y wants?

Generation Y is more free then Generation X. It is certain that we have much more possibility and opportunity than Generation X. We were born when there were homeworks done by help of encyclopedias, then we evolve with technology. First come the PCs and then internet connection. And our lives became easier and faster. That’s why we value and love the technology.

Members of Generation Y have an innovative and entrepreneurial soul. Early members of Generation Y earned some easy money using and developing technology. So late comers believed that it is easy to get rich and famous. And that’s what they wanted; become rich and famous easily.

But we’re raised by Generation X. We’ve raised with the belief of guaranteed standards is best thing in our lives. Entrepreneurship is a risk, and taking risks is stupidity. But at the same time we want money and fame. So we became the generation of white collars. We believed, partly guaranteed life standards, money and fame can be achieved by working in enterprise companies. That was true until a certain point in Turkey.

After crisis in 1999 and 2011 enterprise world renewed their budgets with strict ones. And to me, it is the point where they lost the Generation Y.

Why Generation Y changes job quickly?

Because we are not as stable as Generation X members. They’re determined. When we see that we cannot go any further in the organization we are in, we decide to quit simply for a better one but Generation X waits patiently even until their retirement.

I will give examples from my short professional life. It is short but it has enough job changes to use. It has been a little more than three years and I am in my fourth organization. Let’s have a look why I quit from every single one:

1. Part-time ETL developer in Turkcell Technology, I was waiting for a full time position, but since the budget was cut it was a low possibility to find a full time position inside. My manager was asking for me to wait but I was already graduated and wanted a serious job with a stable paycheck to pay my rent and other expenses. (13 months)
2. Java developer in OBSS, OBSS is really one of the best places for a consultant to work. But I wanted to become an expert in data warehouses, ETL and data mining so I changed my job when I got acceptance from Oracle Consulting (2 months)
3. Associate Consultant in Oracle Turkey Consulting, It was absolutely a dream job and a dream company for me until I became a part of it. It seems like it is the best source that I can learn DW/ETL so I made a sacrifice from my paycheck (it was a mistake I admit.) and I accepted a lower paycheck then my job in OBSS. I thought I am going to learn so many new things, I will become an expert in DW and Oracle. Unfortunately reality is not like that, I was alone in customer location, there were no seniors to ask questions when I lost in code. I began to feel I am not going any better and also I was losing money since the salary was not a competitive one. I decided to quit and start to search for consulting firms, where they pay you more money but no training. I was thinking to save money to pay for my own trainings to improve myself. Then I found my next job. (15 months)
4. BI & DW Specialist in MAKEIT Software & Consulting, finally the job I love and a competitive enough salary to give me a life standard, and company also encourages me to improve myself. Encourages me to present in events, prepare training materials for new-grad employees, give challenging projects and enough support when I feel lost. (9 months and counting up)

Looking through my experience, I can say Generation Y aims something and when it feels things are not working, it changes strategy to reach its aim.

My aim is to become an expert in DW, ETL and Data Mining as I said. So I always took the steps which is better in my path to my aim. I worked with an AceD (Mr. Gürcan Orhan) and tried to learn as much as I can while I was a part-time, the for a better future I felt I need to move to Oracle and I did, there I saw I am not going anywhere and I changed tracks for the destination. There is only one thing that did not change through these three years, I kept working hard to learn new things and improve myself, in every free time I made demos with new tools, I wrote blog posts, I prepared presentations, I read others blogs and presentations.

Conclusion

To sum up I can say, Generation Y members have an aim, which is a guaranteed life standard and fame. And they will change the path they walk when they fell they cannot get any closer to their aim. For Generation Y work life is not aim of the life, it is just a tool to reach to their aim. It is like a long flight to destination we may need to change planes on the way.

Thanks for reading and please share your thoughts in comment section.

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