Author: Xingyan, Experience Technology Department of Ant Insurance

Author: juejin.cn/user/183803…

preface

In July 2019, I officially left the campus and started my career at Ant. In July 2020, at the beginning of the year, 5-6 promotions passed and will soon enter a new stage.

Here is a record of this year’s growth process of some thoughts and feelings, to draw a successful end to the past year ~

The four stages of growth

If you think of the ant journey as a constant level-up of fighting monsters, no matter what level you are at, you need to go through the following stages to get to the next level

  • Newcomer landing: adapt to the environment of ants, and their current level of work
  • Stand out: Gain the attention and recognition of supervisors through continuous growth and standing at the top of peers
  • Breakthrough: Demonstrate that you can meet the requirements of the next level by planning and completing the critical path and results to the next level
  • Promotion defense: make a systematic review and summary of the past work, tell the judges a story, connect the things you have done in the past, get the recognition of the judges in the promotion field, and pass the promotion.

For the vast majority of people, “new landing” this step is relatively easy (except for the high P 😂), students who can pass the interview ability will certainly be able to complete the work here, in the probation period after the defense passed, it is necessary to remove their new label, and other students stand on the same track. After landing, the next step is not easy, every step, are on their own hone and improve

  • Ant is a company with a constant influx of excellent new blood. How can you stand out from many students at the same level and make your supervisor pay attention to you, willing to give you more challenges and let you take more responsibilities?
  • How to set up a goal to reach the next level, and push to complete it smoothly, and get self-growth and breakthrough in the process? It is worth noting that even if the current level reaches 375, it does not mean that the ability of the next level cannot be met. It is still necessary to mark the Job Model (skill requirements of all levels in the front end of Ali) based on specific scenarios.
  • After being nominated and promoted, how to condenze the things of a year or even several years into a dozen pages of PPT and explain them clearly in 20 minutes to the judges? In the process, it is inevitable to make repeated modifications and key choices, and finally impress the judges with a complete story.

As far as I am concerned, the internship period is two months before the official entry, so it is equivalent to completing the landing stage in advance. (The school students must cherish the internship opportunity, and it is better to have some time to adapt to the internship before the entry, which can relieve a lot of pressure on the landing stage of the probation period.) After formal entry, I could directly undertake the completed business needs and participate in the technical construction of the group, and generate some thoughts of my own. Meanwhile, I performed well in the school recruitment training and helped the group to get the first place in all evaluations. Therefore, in the defense of the real probation period in October last year, I was able to express a lot of content, which was recognized by the supervisor and the big boss. When I successfully completed the formal transfer, I also got the award of outstanding new talent of the Technology Department, and officially began to “show up”. One month after the defense of the probation period, when I was focusing on S2 target with the supervisor and senior, I began to make and sprint KPI with the goal of promotion next year. The pressure on me increased significantly. I started to own a business line in business, and started to lead special projects in technology, including operation of the middle stage, general marketing and intelligent platform building. In the busy period before the Spring Festival, the business had occupied all the energy of daily life, but all parts of the technical construction had to be pushed forward according to the rhythm. At that time, it was normal to work overtime until midnight every day, but fortunately, with the help of the team of students and my own practical, I finally made it through. After the holiday, I came back and carried out some key business projects. The planned technical matters were also completed on schedule and landed in the business. Looking back at this period of time, although full of all kinds of hardships and exhaustion, but also virtually completed the breakthrough of self. Then I got good performance and nomination opportunities. The 5-6 promotion field was relatively easy. I was able to resist a business line as the owner and get along well with the business. Technically able to be responsible for the complete functional module, bring a certain business value, and comb out the expression clearly, you can successfully pass ~

In more than a year since the internship, I have completed these four stages and entered the next level smoothly, starting a new cycle. In this year’s growth process of a few more experience experience, in the following simple summary ~

Seven lessons from growing up

1. Constant input and thinking

Ali economy has very broad resources, as long as we make full use of the advantages of resources here, we can quickly get input and promotion that is difficult to get outside. As my supervisor Wrote

Ali for us, the biggest value, is to provide a group of excellent colleagues, for example, the front end, ali has 2500 + front end, in theory, the 2500 people of the knowledge of the brain added up to a maximum of (entropy), is the upper limit of this group of the wisdom of crowds, have you ever make full use of the boost their wisdom, have you ever thought how to close to the ceiling.

From the beginning of the internship, I have formed the habit of spending about an hour in Yuq and ATA (Ali internal technology community) every day, reading all kinds of great bull’s articles, and simply recording some of my thinking experience. After formally joining the company, I began to pay attention to the weekly reports of major front end teams outside insurance. Including micro loan team, wealth team, experience technology department, Amoy interactive building team, the front committee to jointly build each special. Ali’s front end is undoubtedly the top in China, and these large front end teams are the pacemakers of Ali’s front end, so they can be said to be the best internal information source. What brother team are doing every week, for your own input is very much, sometimes I think to a good idea, thought very novel, we found that there are a lot of people also think, even some people have tried to fell to the ground, and then in the process of the ground, some succeeded, some failed, and all kinds of thinking decision among this, The journey of mind is also recorded one by one, which is a very wonderful feeling, as if you have been given a time machine to peer into the future in advance. A good understanding of the front-end teams across the economy will also help us avoid duplication and closed-door technology decisions, and enable us to better leverage and work together to build a set of standards and ecology. Weekly newspaper, of course, is just a form, the core of broadening the channels for their access to information, now even in the absence of weekly, can also through a variety of project documentation, special planning, promotion record summary, discussion, even also can communicate face to face, to see economies front-end process of the operation of the team thinking so that they can constantly close to upper limit of the wisdom of the front end groups. In addition to Ali system, Github Trending, JavaScript/React Weekly, Qcon, Developer conference of Google/Microsoft/Apple, etc., can also be paid attention to and understood. If you feel that there are too many information sources, you can’t pay attention to them. In the field of technology, it is also very important to input and practice some methodology. For example, “Fast Growth Series” is really worth reading again and again. The practice of these high-quality methodologies can help us further improve our information processing and output expression ability after getting sufficient input, so that we can train and improve ourselves more quickly and achieve a faster growth rate than expected.

2. Be opinionated and purposeful

Ali is a highly talent-intensive company. In order to stand out and be seen by everyone, we must strive for something by ourselves. When we go to school, we have a fixed schedule. We finish the course step by step, get high marks, and have good results. But in the workplace, it’s unlikely that supervisors will have a clear schedule for everyone, and even if they do, it may not suit you. Maybe you have P6+ ability and are expected to hit P7, but the supervisor only gives you P6 tasks and thinks it is enough to do these things well without taking the initiative to fight for them. Even if you really do well in the end, you may only be 3.5+ at most. No one knows you better than you do, and you still need to have a clear vision of what you want to become and what you want to accomplish to get there. Then focus on the specific target breakdown with your supervisor, whose role is to guide you in the broad direction, make sure you don’t go astray, and help you coordinate resources and cooperation when necessary. In the face of business or technical challenges, it is necessary to have a “right now, right now” mentality, take the initiative to jump out of the current comfort zone, take on more responsibilities, and dare to lead at critical moments. These are the characteristics of talents needed by organizations.

3. Manage business expectations

As the front end of the business line, business is our basic plate, but also the rich soil of our technological innovation. We not only need to ensure the quality and quantity of business requirements, so that the business first win, but also in the process of technological precipitation and personal growth, to avoid being submerged by endless business requirements, become a screw in the business ship. Therefore, daily communication skills with business are very important. We need to manage business expectations. Here are some personal skills

  • Prioritize your needs: don’t accept temporary communication needs, refuse to reverse daily projects, and don’t squeeze yourself. Key projects require ALL IN to achieve business goals. Here, it is clear that the proportion of each priority is good, so that the internal inventory of the business is good, not every project is finally arranged out of the “key project” 😂
  • I actively communicated with business students to understand the general direction and key methods of business in the fiscal year, so that we could pilot and implement technology in accordance with the daily business needs when we were doing technology construction.
  • Appropriately give the business some small surprise, do some things beyond the business expectations, for example, originally is a fixed scene, spend more than half a day to make it can be refined operation, support business configuration to achieve different effects, in the future business really need to use, found that can play so flexible, is also a small surprise ~

But in general, the daily business development is still relatively boring, we must need to find ways to reduce the proportion of pure business input as far as possible. Or to improve their own output per unit of time (I recommend a student with strong output experience “How TO write elegant Business code”), or to extract and abstract business common components &SDK, or to train outsourced students to share certain work. But this is also to deal with the business needs of “point improvement”, to achieve enabling business, or even lead the business, or rely on the continuous promotion of technology construction, the next talk about some of the experience of doing technology construction.

4. Know how to borrow from others and jointly build an ecology

It is not easy to build technology in the business line. We should not only spare time to build technology in the busy business, but also ensure that the products we build can really be implemented in the business, generate business value and avoid castles in the air. Therefore, the preliminary stage must be combined with the current business scene and the existing technology ecology, do sufficient research, and then quickly get the results. Benefited from within the ants on the attention of technology trends, our group in the “intelligent components”, “intelligent building” on these two products in the technology selection did not go too many detours, due to the morpho SDK (ant marketing building services) ability is not too mature, actually was also hesitated morpho SDK whether meet our demands, Finally saw many economic body, firmly believe that in this setup, the ant is at the bottom of the material and ecological will be unified, start anew way will not only expend resources, achieve the ability, the basis of existing again and two sets of patterns will also deepen the mental burden of developers and users, will be integrated in the future. Therefore, in the end, we firmly chose the component ecology based on Sherry Componets (Ant Marketing Component RESEARCH and development specification) and the building service of Morpho butterfly, combined with the characteristics of the insurance intelligent operation platform to carry out the packaging of the upper layer, which allows us to focus on the core and differentiation. When we met Sherry and the morpho SDK did not support it, we directly mentioned MR to supplement it. Looking back at the whole process, we not only used technology products to serve our own business scenarios, but also made a small contribution to the front-end ecology of ants

5. Quality and stable team

Although the company values embrace change, I always feel that working in a quality and stable team is more conducive to personal growth. Frequent changes and adjustments may disrupt the personal rhythm of doing things. I am also very lucky to meet a very good director Izumi stack and senior brother Asang. We got to know each other at the end of 2018, and finally got the offer from Ant and decided to come here. When I started to work together formally in nineteen nineteen, my supervisor and my senior always gave me careful and patient guidance and gave me room to give full play, which helped me to achieve self-growth and breakthrough continuously. Finally, we were promoted together this year, and the last two years of hard work came to a happy ending. It was an unforgettable experience. I also witnessed the insurance business in the process of explosive growth, and the front team from the first ten people to now nearly 40 people rapid expansion, the growth of the business we reversed transmission for a variety of technical system exploration and precipitation, the individual also is very lucky to be involved, for the insurance of the front end of the middle construction contributes own strength.

The insurance front end team is still expanding rapidly, with more than 40 people now, and the team will continue to expand in the future. Therefore, we sincerely hope that more p6-P8 students can join us. If you have any intention, please send your resume to [email protected]

6. Be happy at work

It is important to think clearly about the meaning and value of your work in the highly stressful environment of ants. As far as I am concerned, in the front end of the insurance team, the Internet insurance industry is booming externally, and there is a very broad market space waiting for us to explore. Internally, it is a great sense of accomplishment for us to be able to truly empower and promote business development with the power of technology by building Chinese capabilities, service operations and developers. Although the process is very hard, sometimes I feel anxious because there are too many things to do, but in essence I recognize these things, so the problems encountered can be solved through various ways. On the other hand, if you do not recognize what you are doing, coupled with great work pressure, it can be very painful, every day is full of suffering and feeling powerless, in this case, actively communicate feedback, or change the team, or even leave the ant is a reasonable choice. So keep a positive and optimistic attitude, make yourself happy, in a good state of mind must be easier to grow and improve ~

7. Trust that things will work out

It is often said that promotion will come naturally. My understanding is that if you have met the requirements of the next level, and are doing things at the next level, you will be seen. For example, as a P5 student, I can take the lead and participate in the team’s technology construction or even lead my own technology products. As a P6 student, I can have a systematic consciousness, define “WHY/HOW/WHAT” well, and have certain depth in a certain field. As a P7 student… (here I don’t jump to discuss, or see big guys’ experience 🙈). But as my senior mentioned in his promotion summary

Promotion is a breakthrough. It is only when you break through yourself that it is natural for you to get promoted. There is a breakthrough in the rise of each level, which is not necessarily, and most of the time, it is not just “doing things well at hand”.

Therefore, even if my ability has reached the next level, I am still doing things at this level. It should not be difficult to get good performance, but I will definitely be challenged to get promoted. This goes back to the second point. When you are confident about your ability, you must be “independent and purposeful” and take the initiative to plan the critical path and results to the next level. In the process, you must jump out of your comfort zone to take on greater responsibilities and meet higher challenges. After good planning, upward communication, after the supervisor’s recognition, to push the matter to take the results. When these are really completed, to achieve a breakthrough on the self, so is sure to be seen by the organization, to achieve “natural”.

New starting point new journey

Recent fiscal year has just finished IDP (individual development plan), stand at a new starting point, the current state of their overall is good, energetic, passionate, continues to grow at the same time, the output is rich, should be regarded as a qualified P6 levels, but in the next year to P6 head level, and even reached the requirements of the next level, At present, there are still some gaps, we need to find some changes and breakthroughs fundamentally, and at the same time, we are still troubled by the following points. Also explore the corresponding solution:

  • Insufficient input in business: the business planning of insurance donation is not clear, and it is difficult to find the starting point for improving efficiency. In terms of general marketing, I have a scattered understanding of the entire insurance marketing system, and I did not deeply participate in some marketing activities outside insurance giveaway, which may be the realization of a component or a function, and I lack the opportunity to have a dialogue with the business from the project establishment stage.
  • Technical depth is not enough: a lot of time in the extraction of some general components, SDK, etc., general P6 can do, how to make different and highlights. And in the process to find the technical depth of the power point.
  • Time management: Too much concurrency, scattered energy, lack of time to invest in core matters, time to study and think has been reduced compared with FY20. The partner has difficulty pushing forward, spends a lot of time on communication and collaboration, and lacks feedback from the other side.
  • Integration: now it is too closely connected with the insurance business, in fact, it is difficult to precipitation reuse outside insurance, unlike the construction of some basic technologies and efficiency tools, which can be quickly promoted to the gold line dimension. At the same time, I sorted out the feedback of the front-end promotion judges in the past two years, and some questions really hit my pain points. For example, what are the reusable points really accumulated in the front-end technology? Or is it just a series integration in the system, not a good answer at present.

From the perspective of the competency model at the next level, you can clearly understand your strengths and weaknesses:

Here we use the P7 model in the mind of one of our senior technical experts

Be independent and make plans: What I have done so far is ok, but I need to keep doing it. I need to help the team make plans together from my own planning

Recent business: Although I can have a simple conversation with business, I still don’t have a deep understanding of business. Most of them stay at the execution level and don’t reflect the “thinking” of business.

Ramming technology: in the “field of the problem of the terminator” this is not enough, lack of understanding of the bottom. In the fiscal year, I hope to build a system to precipitate something deep.

Operation ability: Lack of coordination ability at present, external cooperation without the focus of the boss, it is difficult to rely solely on personal promotion, and I have not found good practical experience for the time being.

So the core of the next stage is to do subtraction first. Focus on the core issues, to provide a set of systematic solutions as the core context, to do a variety of things in series, to achieve a sense of business, technology depth, can tell a complete story. Specific landing planning will be further detailed disassembly ~

All the past is a prologue. It is only seven months since 2020, and so many events have already happened in the world. When I go back to my daily work, the contradiction between the goal of sustained rapid growth of business and the bottleneck of technical resources is also fierce, which is bound to be a very difficult year. But that’s the way it is at Alibaba. I never get a chance to be in my comfort zone. Every time I think I’ve settled in well, new challenges keep coming. I hope that after this year’s training, whether I or the whole team, in business understanding and technical ability, can stand on a new step 😆

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