What's your job about?
PEXA developed the world’s first national e-conveyancing platform that allows buyers and sellers to settle property electronically. An important part of the graduate program is the opportunity to experience different parts of the business through rotations. While the everyday tasks of my rotations have been different, my overarching responsibility as a graduate is to develop my knowledge of the business and my technical/soft skills.
I joined the PEXA Insights team as a developer for my first rotation and my daily work consisted of developing new features for the product and creating the user interface to replicate designs. Achieving this required me to learn the tools used by the team such as Typescript, React and other third-party libraries, most of which I learned through a course or on the job. I would often work closely with the back-end engineers to define the expected responses from the APIs, and regularly discussed design ideas with the designer.
For my second rotation, I am a back-end engineer for the interoperability team who is responsible for creating a new set of APIs to allow interoperable settlement. Each API is broken down into several different parts, each of which is unique challenge and leads to great support between the team members. This team conducts a 30-minute session every day to discuss technical issues and things learned the day prior, providing a great opportunity to learn about parts of the project you’re not working on directly.
What's your background?
I grew up and went to school in Sydney. I was not an excellent student when I was younger, so when I graduated, I went straight into the workforce so I could start making a living. I enjoyed what I was doing, but after a few years, I decided I needed to shake things up. This process began with a long overdue trip overseas and led me to enrol in university as a mature age student to study something I always had an interest in - technology. I wasn’t sure what area of technology I wanted to focus on, but I quickly discovered my passion for programming and made an effort to study all the software development units I was offered.
After several years of study, I was eager to begin my career as a software developer and began applying for graduate roles in my final 6 months. As my degree was nearing its end, I was lucky enough to receive an offer from PEXA to join their graduate program, starting in July 2021. Despite being advertised as a Melbourne position, PEXA were supportive of me remaining in Sydney and the remote working experience has been excellent.
I have now been a PEXArian for 9 months, completing my first rotation as a member of the Insights team and am now working as part of the interoperability team.
Could someone with a different background do your job?
Definitely! I believe that software development is one of the most accessible careers available as there are many excellent resources online for teaching, and the potential for remote working makes it flexible for people with different time restraints. In my time at PEXA, I have encountered people from many different backgrounds, each with a unique story of how they got where they are. The one common thread between everyone though is a keen desire to learn, an enthusiasm for problem-solving and a willingness to support their team members.
What's the coolest thing about your job?
The coolest thing about my job is that I have been given interesting and meaningful work from day 1 of the grad program. My first rotation in PEXA Insights had me developing the front-end of a new product, while my second rotation has me focused on creating the back-end of a large-scale project. Having the trust and support of PEXA to work on exciting projects is something I truly value, as I know this is not something that all graduate programs offer. This can be challenging at times, but the teams I have worked with are always supportive and happy to help you learn whatever is required.
What are the limitations of your job?
To be successful as a software engineer you are required to continuously learn new technology and develop creative solutions to complex problems. Most of the time this is fun, but there are certainly days when it can be mentally exhausting, especially when you feel like you’re spinning your wheels. Sometimes you just need to make a cup of tea and have a break so you can properly focus.
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