Meet our Academy Consultants – Caitlin Worrillow

The Ten10 Academy offers top tech training for people from any background. For example, Caitlin Worrillow worked in Retail before deciding to change careers and join the world of IT. We sat down with her to discuss her journey, including relocating for her client work, what she’s currently working on, and how she makes the most of every opportunity to develop her tech skills even further.

How do you feel you’ve transitioned from the Ten10 Academy to your client work?

Surprisingly well, considering I was working in Retail beforehand! I was worried about going into an office scenario and a different world. I knew I had learned all this stuff but how am I going to apply it? But it’s worked really well. It’s kind of like the Greeks vs Romans analogy: thinking vs doing. So had done all the theory and then could be given tasks. I was always able to say “Hey, I need you to explain this a bit more to me so that can understand exactly what you want from me.” And then it was just a matter of making sure that I did what I did well, and I think I’ve done that!

Take us through your placement – what client teams have you worked with and what specific projects have you been responsible for during your placement?

On my client, I’m only working with one team as we’re doing one project and I’ve been brought on specifically for it. We are replacing voice communications and part of that has been making sure that the solutions we want to implement are possible, so we need to working circuit to make sure that we can actually put in one of the solutions that is the easiest and the best cost-wise.

We found that there were a lot of faults in the places that we wanted to implement this. My main task is that I monitor those faults and work with our supplier to make sure that they get fixed. That way, we can implement that solution. I will check in on my faults and ask, “Have there been updates today?” I created an ADO backlog for the project which was really fun. This project is Agile and it was fun to learn – a little scary at first because I’d heard so much about ADO but it’s surprisingly easy. In my downtime at work, when the faults have been slow, (which we would prefer!) I ask around to see if there is anything I can get involved in. I like to go in the office so I’ve ended up helping with a project where I’ve been checking the SLAs with our suppliers to see if there are ways that we can improve communication with them, and then I managed to get involved in another project in involving the re-pointing of some satellites.

What parts of the Ten10 Academy training have been most useful in your placement?

It’s really interesting because I wouldn’t say there’s anything more useful than anything else. I’ve applied everything. When we did the Testing documentation, once I got past the realisation it was like a university essay with the criteria and marking, it all slotted into my head a bit better. When I came across actual documentation for the business that I’m on client with, it was a lot easier to understand. Now I can read it and understand it instead of everyone being like “You just kind of go based on this…” Weirdly, Java was really helpful for me in understanding Excel formulas, which makes no sense! I think the way that Java is in my mind, it’s kind of little Lego bricks in the way it all builds up. That helps me understand the way the formulas worked and I could visualise it better in my mind.

What is a normal working day or week for you?

I go into the office every day unless I have chosen to go home for the weekend because I am hybrid – I could work from home, I just prefer the office environment, and on client, we get two rather large monitors. So I would much prefer that than to be sat in my room! It’s also nice to be able to talk to people in the office.

Immediately I check my email and my Teams, because there’s always the potential that something could go wrong and you want to make sure that you’re up-to-date on it. After that I just load up my faults and check that there’s not been an update, or if there is I’ll talk to our supplier and ask for any information that they have on it. Then it depends on whatever’s currently going on.

Now that I’m working on the SLA spreadsheet, I check the daily updates for that and input those. If there are change requests that need to be set up I’ll do those, or I’ll check them for approval if that’s what stage they’re in. If they’re all approved and everything’s happy, I’ll just work on something that’s been pushed to the side for other priorities – it’s constantly changing.

Has your role and/or responsibilities changed during your time on placement?

I think so! When I started it was mainly administrative work and as I became more trusted by showcasing that I am capable, I’ve managed to get to the point where I can now process change requests and be responsible for those. I can process sub-10k contracts, being a signer for those, and I’ve also ended up responsible for explaining ADO to my team since they’re not very familiar with it. I was self-taught and I get to explain to people how it works.

What technology, tools, frameworks, and processes have you gained experience with since starting client work?

I mainly use Excel. I learned a bit about Project, but we tend to stick to Excel – which I have to say that I prefer because of the conditional formatting, and I like using the colours I’ll be honest! I got a lot of opportunity to work with that and understand that a lot better. Then there’s ADO which I never thought I would be doing in Project Management, but I’m glad I learned to use it. it’s very useful.

Learning change requests as a concept, in general, was really useful because I think you kind of know of them when updates come up, but I hadn’t really understood how it works in the background at all. Recently in the news when Microsoft was down, I thought to myself, ‘how did that change request get past?’ now I know how it works.

Generally for me, it’s more understanding how businesses work behind the scenes than it is learning a lot of different tools, but it’s been really useful.

How has your client supported your development?

I think it’s been really good. My client did a learning week and I joined a couple of lectures. There was one on budgeting which I found useful and they also offered workshops, such as Agile and ADO which helped.

My team has always made a point to include me in all the meetings right from the start. Even if it wasn’t necessarily relevant to me or wasn’t something that I couldn’t contribute to, it was good to have that background knowledge. I’ve learned a lot from just observing, about how to host your own meetings.

My team provide a really safe environment for asking questions. There were so many times that I’ve needed an explanation of a certain acronym, for example, and I’ve ended up creating my own glossary because there’s just so many that you come across.

What support have you received from Ten10 during your placement?

Ten10 continue to support my learning. I can put in requests for courses and certifications and I know that I can continue elevating myself. There are financial aids from Ten10, they reimbursed my railcard recently, which I really appreciate because getting back from Perth to Leeds is pricey and is a very lengthy journey! I know that the Wellbeing team are just a Google Chat away, and they’re all really responsive. If I have questions, or if I need anything, I can always ask and they’ll get me the best answer they can.

What’s it like working with project stakeholders so early in your career?

I’ve not really had experience with stakeholders prior to this. I guess the closest would be when I did additional BA training and it was the Ten10 trainers masquerading as them, but even that was different from how they appeared in my mind and that corporate idea of “my boss can’t know things are going bad” and you don’t want to get yelled at by the higher up, etc. For that reason, I guess I saw them all as this big scary other-type being, and it’s been very different to learn that they’re not.

I discuss the risks with them as much as I discuss how well the project is going. You’re working with them, giving them visibility of what you’re doing so they can make informed decisions about the business above where you are.

What would you say to someone considering joining the Ten10 Tech Academy?

Go for it! You have nothing to lose from applying. I worked in Retail as a supervisor before this, so it does give you that leap in a career. As long as you enjoy learning and you work hard. It’s the same as everything else. If you work at it and if stars align, it will be worth it!