My Journey at Perfios: Lessons from My First Job

Joining Perfios: The Beginning of My Professional Journey

I started my full-time role at Perfios Software Solutions in September 2023, fresh out of college. My initial month was dedicated to intensive training on core Java and data analysis. By mid-October, I joined the Insights team, where I familiarized myself with the extensive codebase through walkthrough videos. This phase helped me understand the intricate interactions between data analysis, server code, report generation, and UI components.

Understanding the Development Lifecycle

Coming from an internship background focused on individual projects, I initially struggled with the structured release lifecycle at Perfios. Fortunately, the Insights team had excellent documentation, which helped me grasp the following workflow:

Issue Creation – CST creates an issue.
Assignment & Scoping – A senior developer assigns the issue, and developers estimate the effort required.
Triage & Milestone Assignment – Senior members review and prioritize issues.
Development & Merge Request – The developer completes the task and raises an MR for review.
QA Testing & Release – The QA team verifies the fix before releasing it to production.

Perfios followed a weekly release cycle, with major deployments occurring on the first three Tuesdays of each month. By March 2024, we successfully achieved an 8 PM release timeline by enforcing strict guidelines for MR submission and testing.

Overcoming Initial Challenges: Scoping & Time Management

One of my biggest challenges was estimating issue complexity during scoping. Initially, I underestimated dependencies, leading to delays. One example was a salary transaction categorization task, where I failed to account for edge cases like salary debits due to excess payments. I learned that effective scoping requires foresight into potential complexities and cross-team collaboration.

To manage my workload better, I developed a color-coded tracking system:

Green – Completed tasks
Yellow – In-progress tasks
Red – Terminated (on hold or infeasible)
Blue – Scoped issues with effort estimates

This approach helped me prioritize tasks efficiently and meet deadlines.

Key Technologies & Skills Acquired

Working at Perfios was a hands-on learning experience. Over nearly 1.5 years, I worked primarily on bank statement analysis report customizations, developing logic for extracting insights from financial data. The tech stack I worked on included:

R for data analysis
Scala for report generation
Java for API development

I also gained practical experience with Git version control, learning commands like:

git branch git clone git merge git log git checkout git cherry-pick git pull git status git push git rebase git show git commit git reset

Using Git daily reinforced its importance in managing large-scale projects and maintaining a clean code history.

Cross-Team Collaboration & Client Customizations

I had the opportunity to customize reports and APIs for over 40 clients, including 16 international clients from Indonesia, Kenya, Singapore, the UAE, and more. This experience taught me how to:

Efficiently communicate with CST, QA, and PM teams.
Understand client requirements and assess feasibility.
Optimize code for performance, considering large-scale data processing needs.

Working on performance improvements also helped me appreciate the importance of writing efficient, vectorized code to reduce turnaround time (TAT) and infrastructure costs.

Mentoring & Leadership

As I gained experience, I had the privilege of mentoring new hires, guiding them through the complex Insights codebase and helping them troubleshoot issues. Since I had personally faced challenges when starting, I could anticipate their roadblocks and provide proactive solutions. This experience honed my communication skills and solidified my understanding of the product.

Final Reflections

Perfios provided a fantastic work environment with supportive managers and experienced mentors who guided me throughout my journey. The experience helped me:

Adapt to structured development cycles and follow best practices.
Improve my time management and issue-tracking skills.
Strengthen my technical expertise in R, Scala, and Java.
Gain confidence in cross-functional collaboration and client interactions.

As I transition to my next opportunity, I carry forward these invaluable lessons and skills that have shaped me into a more competent and confident software developer.

Hold on