Eldan Abdrashim

Eldan, 28 hails from Almaty, he’s a graduate of International IT University. In the summer of 2018, he won in a difficult competition and became a participant in the first summer school for Data Analysts Yessenov Data Lab. The training lasted 8 weeks. Among the teachers were world-class experts from EPAM Systems, Yandex Money, AGT International, Kaspi and ALMAU. Today, the Kazakhstani works as a Software Engineer in the capital of Catalonia – Barcelona – at Microsoft. Here’s the story of how he came this way, and what life hacks he can share.

How and why did you choose the IT?
I’ll start with the fact that I studied at an ordinary secondary school №58 and was fond of mathematics. In my spare time, I was seriously interested in computers. I realized quite early on that in the future I would like to develop computer programs. After graduating from school, I entered the IITU, Faculty of Mathematics, the Department of Mathematical and Computer Modeling. I had a strong desire to use mathematics in programming. So, as a university student, I began to slowly engage in Olympiad programming and Data Science.

 Why do you think you won the Yessenov Foundation competition?
After obtaining bachelor’s degree in 2017, I actively engaged in Data Science and started working in this direction. Next year, my friends told me about the Yessenov Foundation and a competition of the foundation for talented students who wanted to study data science or improve their qualifications in this field. I believed that I had great skills to win. I also had an advantage, because at the time of the competition I was already working in Data Science.

What did Yessenov Data Lab give you?
I remember that the learning process was very intensive. We studied 5 days a week, started in the morning with the study of new topics, and immediately after conducted experiments on them. At Yessenov Data Lab, I was able to gain new knowledge on machine learning and start using it in my work. The summer school gave to me good skills in the field of data science. I also immediately began to put them into practice. In general, the experience of studying at the Yessenov Data Lab helped to significantly improve my qualifications.

What life hacks are you ready to share with future IT specialists and those who do not participate in such competitions and do not believe in their own strength?
Here the life hacks that I’m eager to share. They are the simplest and the most effective:

1) Your hard work will pay off several times, the main thing is to keep learning;
2) To understand whether you like Data Science, Software Engineering or other IT fields, you need to try each field, without this you will not know if it is your cup of tea;
3) If you have found your business, improve your skills every day, and you will not notice how in a couple of years you will find yourself very far from where you started;
4) Develop habits that will help you constantly improve your skills.

What are your responsibilities at Microsoft?
I work as a Software Engineer on a Bing Search product, the Deeplinks team. My responsibilities include developing response ranking systems when using Bing search, developing and configuring pipelines in this search engine for machine learning models, as well as updating and improving links for the first page of Bing search using machine learning.

What are you planning to do in a couple of years?
As you told you, I work at Microsoft, and I have an indefinite contract with this company. In addition, this fall I created my own IT platform for the whole of Kazakhstan and Central Asia. Since I plan to be involved in startups in the foreseeable future, my platform is the first step in this direction.

How do you like to spend your free time?
In my free time, I am engaged in my IT-Nomads project. In addition to the platform, I spend time with my family, travel and like to read books. 4-5 times a week I run, swim and ride a bike in Barcelona, so you can say that I do triathlon. In winter I like to snowboard. I have almost no free time to watch TV series/movies and play computer games.

According to you, what are the three most important qualities in a person?
I’ll change the question. Three important qualities that helped me personally. First, be honest. Especially with yourself. Moreover, this applies to absolutely any sphere of life. The second is perseverance and a desire to learn and work improving every day. And finally: to dream of more, so that even a small part of what will be achieved will seem very impressive.