Internship at Adobe – Nikita from IIIT, Delhi
About the Author: Nikita Gupta, from Indraprastha Institute of Information Technology, Delhi (IIIT-D), reminisces about her enriching journey as the product intern for Adobe Systems.
Transitions are hard. Interning at Adobe was my first industry experience and I still remember how intimidated I was on my first day. From the protective environment of student life, I was stepping into the corporate world. There were several doubts in my mind. Back then, little did I know that these two months will prove to be one of the best learning experiences of my life. I chose to do an internship as I wanted to clear things out for myself. I wanted to see what it’s like to work for a tech giant like Adobe and whether I would like to join the industry after my graduation. I always had a strong inclination towards research and wanted to know if the industry would have enough research opportunities to offer. After joining Adobe, I realized I had the best of both the worlds.
I joined as a product intern at Adobe Noida, under the Adobe Acrobat DC team. All my inhibitions were put to rest as I was warmly welcomed by the team. I was treated as a valued member, apart from constantly being encouraged to take part in the discussions. It felt good to know that I was not just another temporary employee for them. They cared about my growth and learning. Not only was I working on a very interesting research problem, my work was to be integrated with an existing product to make it better. It was thrilling to realize that the work I was involved in had the potential to affect millions of users worldwide. This was a great motivation in itself. All interns were given very interesting research problems to solve. They spanned across various domains like augmented reality, machine learning and neural networks, data science to name a few. Projects were assigned to each intern keeping in mind their interests and past experience. However, this wasn’t strictly based on their skill-set. My manager always stressed that things can always be learnt and one just needs to have the right attitude to achieve them. For instance, I had no knowledge or experience with neural networks but a major part of my internship required me to work with them. This way, I got the opportunity to learn many new things of which I’m very proud of. This boosted my selfconfidence and made me believe in myself more.
The work culture at Adobe is simply amazing. What truly makes an organization great are the people that work for it. I realized this after meeting the exceptionally goal-driven employees at Adobe. What I liked the most was how people were always eager to help each other out. Everybody’s opinions were respected regardless of age, gender, and experience. This made everyone feel important and comfortable at the workplace. Adobe also stressed a lot on the overall well-being of its employees. It gave its employees the opportunity to pursue sports, dance, and other interests on its campus. Workshops were frequently organized to educate the employees about exercising, right postures while working, and meditation. The timings were flexible and there was free food too! I also got the opportunity to join my team for the team trip to a hill station.
My growth was not only limited to the technical side; I also developed soft skills along the way. I learnt how important a collaboration is while making decisions. We used to have weekly meetings where the entire team would discuss the progress and the possible solutions that could be tried. This gave birth to some of the best ideas and better solutions. Each member of the team brought in something new and different to the team. After all, it’s the individuals that make a team.
During the course of my internship, I learnt many things. One of them is to not shy away from asking for help. Initially, I was hesitant to ask for help thinking it would reflect badly on my skills. I ended up spending weeks on a problem which could have been avoided had I taken help from somebody who had prior experience in that domain. I would have saved myself all the stress and precious time. I later realized how it is okay to not know something. There were times when others sought my help too. You give what you have and take what you don’t. Learn and grow. Do not shy away from trying things out of your comfort zone. Push yourself to widen that zone by embracing new challenges. Nothing can match the satisfaction that one feels when the job is finally done. Absorb as much as you can; you are not going to get this opportunity again.
Overall, I’m thankful to have Adobe as my first industry experience. It has left a positive mark on my personality and taught me things that would propel me to always go forward, along with giving me memories to cherish. Adobe has the right mix of fun and challenges without which a caterpillar may never know it has wings to fly!
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