In learning, you will teach, and in mentoring, you will learn

Over the course of the coming years, my dream is to personally groom at least 100 individuals and to help steer their career paths into the right direction. The spirit of mentoring is to break the monotony of our everyday lives and to have meaningful interactions with like - minded individuals.

I am Onkar Parmar, a mentor at Scaler Academy and I am currently employed at Digital Sherpa. Encapsulating my professional journey of twenty years in words is an extremely difficult task, because the journey has been immensely gratifying and life-changing in several ways. My childhood was the stuff of dreams, I grew up in a beautiful village, well isolated from the hustle bustle of city life. I completed my initial education at my native place itself, and then moved to Kanpur to pursue a Bachelor's degree in Aerospace Engineering.

Life at the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur (IIT - K) was nothing short of a rollercoaster ride. I first saw my first computer at college, and instantaneously fell in love with it. At that time, we were taught a program called Pascal, which formed the foundation of my trials and tribulations with programming and coding. I cherished the time I spent at the computer lab at college, and I would lose track of time fiddling with the software. I completed my Masters in Computer Science from Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi.

Work is worship for me. I believe that one must strive to learn new things, and broaden one’s horizons while engaging with work related commitments. This passion for learning led me to my current company, where I help build products for our clients located across the globe. My role involves engineering leadership, where I manage the responsibility of leading the architecture for the structure of our products, and also work in constant collaboration with the clients. Even today, I ensure that I keep engaging with projects as a developer, so that I keep upgrading my skill set according to the changing times.

Mentoring has been an indispensable part of my career orientation; all these years, alongside my other roles and responsibilities, I have always tried to pursue mentoring in some way or the other. At my current company, I additionally handle the responsibility of talent acquisition and training. I help identify talented students from colleges for our projects, and groom individuals for furthering their careers in the field. Mentoring always has run parallel to my work responsibilities, and I thoroughly enjoy it. My earlier entrepreneurship venture helped me provide first jobs to 70-odd people, from various colleges across India.

Scaler came into my life through an advertisement that read - “Join us as a Mentor.” These words were enough for me to say, ‘why not?’, and I reached out to the team for the further process. At the onset of my journey as a mentor, I have to admit, I was a little nervous. However, with time, my passion and interest got me to get rid of all my hesitations and kept me going. As a mentor, I focus on identification of strengths and weaknesses of the learners in the initial sessions and then build up on their skill sets. I have my own approach towards interacting with students, and I encourage them to try out newer avenues.

With every passing session, I aim to make my next session better and more insightful for the mentee. I place emphasis on clarity of vision and planning of goals, because it is very important to have a proper direction to attain professional growth. Time management and skill upgradation are the key to making it big in the industry. I maintain an ambient, healthy environment and engage with my mentees as a friendly guide, which helps me understand their expectations and experiences.

My advice to young coders is to prioritize their learning curve over other aspects while accepting a position at any company. Now is the time when you can take up that course, learn that new skill or take that plunge. Time never waits for anyone and to succeed, one must value the importance of the present.  Growth is of utmost importance, and one must place enough emphasis on personal growth.