A day in the life of a Software Engineer in GovTech Hive
By: Rabiah Khairy
Tags: Workplace Culture, Agile, Scrum, Software Engineering

I step into the lobby of the Sandcrawler — the lift lights up in a way that makes me think I’m in a StarWars film — no surprise here though, our office building is modeled after the mobile fortress.

I walk to my desk and see that a couple of my teammates are already hard at work. Their black screens are showing multicolored codes with the sound of their keyboards typing away. I smile with a good morning wish to my desk neighbors and proceed to the pantry to make coffee.

10 am: Hello

“HELLO FROM THE OTHER SIDEEEEEEEE.

I MUST HAVE CALLED A THOUSAND TIMEEEEE.

TO TELL YOU IM SORRY FOR BReaking your heart…” (song gradually fades)

That’s our daily standup call from our LCD TV. Everyone in the team starts gathering around it, which is showing a burnup chart, to visit our progress of that sprint. As usual, our Scrum Master is the first one to be there, patiently waiting for everyone to assemble before beginning our daily scrum ritual. Everyone then starts sharing their updates to the team by answering these 3 questions:

What did I do yesterday

What will I be doing today

Any blockers to my productivity?

After the last person has shared his/her updates, the Scrum Master poises his hands in the air to clap and everybody follows his movement.

Scrum Master: “If there’s nothing else then that’s the end of standup” *clap in unision*

The day has started for the Reach Team.

Do you know how important that clap is to the team? That clap is a symbol of us being committed to each other, a single atomic unit that regardless of what kind of roles you hold, you and the work that you’re doing is vital to the success of the project.

12 pm: Keyboard Warriors

Not the kind you find in social media forums, debating aimlessly on certain issues. We walk the talk and deliver actual work here. No fluffs or frills. The pitter-patter sound of the keyboards hasn’t stopped since we had our standup. Everybody is busy focussing on delivering high-quality software.

Just when we’re about to complete that “last” chunk of code…

“Guys lunch?”

*Silence*

“Guuyssssss lets go. I’m hungry”

The developers look up and as expected, it’s always one of our pretty UX Designers who informs us of lunchtime.

Developer 1: “Wait ah, let me finish this first”

Developer 2: “Yeah wait, 5 minutes!”

12.15 pm: Food > Team

UX Designer 1: “ Guyyyyyyssss let’s go lunch 😩”

And earns a few “okay-okay” as they get up.

Because food > team, the team is split into 3 groups:

• Functional eaters call themselves the “Cai Fan Gang”. They frequently patron a nearby food court at Blk 69 for economical rice meals

• Basic food kakis would make their way to Timbre+ or other food outlets around the area

• Those colleagues that always have “something on” during lunch time

But of course, there’re plenty of times where we have lunch together as a team because food bonds people #oneteam

1.15 pm: Grilling Satay Sticks

Well, I don’t mean literally. That’s what the guys call their daily foosball matches after lunch time. And they can be very competitive and savage with one another at it. Work hard, but play harder right?

The Reach guys grilling satay sticks

2 pm

Nothing new. Just us coding our time away delivering high-quality software

3 pm: THE Hour

Now, this is when the team gets interesting. And by interesting, I mean weird.

When you’ve been facing your computer screen for a long time, you tend to get detached from the world around you and start acting strange. Like I legit have witnessed one of my colleagues smiling at his computer screen, that was showing codes mind you, for no sane reason. Or random topics being discussed such as planning our next team bonding outing cause the girls wanted to lead a healthy lifestyle.

A team that hikes together works awesome together (5th of April, 9:30–10:30)

There’re times when the office suddenly gets noisy with their nonsensical jokes. As an observer, it’s an amusing sight to see them laughing at the smallest things. Just when the teasings start to get a little accusing,

“Hey hey guys no fingers pointing ah. We’re one team ah. Remember ah. Eeeeeehehehe”

… And everybody burst out laughing even more.

During this time is also where you see how cross-functional team works together as an atomic unit via frequent collaboration. The great thing about having different kinds of expertise in the team is the synergy and different perspectives you’re able to reap from the discussion. Not to mention you’re able to get instant clarification/assistance fast to get on with your work.

Developers, QEs and BA busy at work

You’ll often see the Development Team come together for discussion such as clarifying uncertainties and confirming requirements to enforce business-IT alignment. You’ll see them challenging and supporting each other on different aspects of the development such as the Quality Engineers helping Developers in covering corner cases. Doubts on UI related matters? Our UX Designers are few steps away for assistance. Pipeline issues? Sure, our DevOps engineer is there to help. As a team, we make sure what we build would reap the highest business value for our Product Owner. #onedream Such passion and dedication.

Our stash of snacks

Oh, and we have a snack corner from the team’s own contribution to help one another get thru the day.

5 pm: The Finale

At this time, well things are back to normal and the team is busy concluding their work of the day before it’s time to bid farewell when the clock strikes 6 pm.

6 pm: The Lucky One

Depending on the team’s mood and if you’re the target of their conversation, you’ll get applause as you make your way out of the office and the world’s attention in the room will focus on you. Talk about awkward. Unless you enjoy getting the limelight.