My experience at Digital Product School (Munich)

Honestly, I do not remember how I came across this opportunity online, but I am glad I did. I found the Digital Product School page one day and it immediately caught my eye. It was exactly what I needed and wanted: gain work experience, be in a diverse environment, and learn a lot of English. The offer was very appealing, but I felt insecure because I thought my CV would not be enough to draw their attention (as I said, I had little work experience and was finishing my degree). I searched on different social networks to see photos and comments from other people, got even more excited, and decided to apply — nothing to lose by trying.

I completely forgot about the application since I assumed I had no chance, until one day they emailed me saying they wanted to move forward with the process. Funny enough, I did not remember what they were talking about — it had been completely wiped from my mind until I looked the program up again online. Great, I had passed the first filter. Now came a huge challenge for me: my first job interview, and the scariest part — in English. I was so nervous about this interview I could barely sleep the night before.

The interview lasted about an hour. The interviewer and I introduced ourselves, he asked me some questions about my CV and other basic computer-science questions. To my surprise I felt very comfortable speaking with him, I could understand him easily, and he was very kind. I asked a few questions about the program and he showed me around the office a bit. The interview ended and I stayed enthusiastic — I felt I had done well.

About three days later, I received the email asking whether I wanted to be part of Batch #5. Very happy, I said yes. Now I would have to start looking for a place to stay in Munich and buy plane tickets.

After looking at several Airbnb rooms and asking at hotels, I realized that staying there was expensive — more than half of the scholarship (750 Euros per month) would go to rent. Fortunately, my family knew a friend who lived in that city, and she warmly took me in.

DPS is a three-month program. Batch #5 started September 10 and ended November 29, 2018. While in Munich I realized how difficult it is to find a place to live, even for a short time. Many people in the program had a hard time — some so much so that they almost could not participate.

Now in Germany, my first challenge in the program awaited: a hike in the Austrian Alps. DPS usually does these mountain hikes to welcome new groups so everyone gets to know each other outside the work environment. The expected duration was an hour. We (a sub-group with me) fell behind and took roughly five hours to reach the top. There were moments I thought I would not make it, and someone else had to carry my backpack (thanks :3). It was very hard, so here is the first survival tip for DPS: do not bring a heavy backpack on the hike; pack only the basics. That was my mistake.

At the top of the mountain we got drinks, rested for a while, and ran our first workshop — an activity for program leaders to understand our expectations and for us to get to know each other better. After that we had a brief presentation and were called to eat. The tables were marked with the names of the people who would form our teams for the next months: two Product Managers, two Software Engineers, an AI Engineer, and an Interaction Designer. We learned the problem we would tackle, picked the team name, and sketched the logo. The day was over.

The first day at the office we received a notebook, a pencil case, a pen, and a beautiful T-shirt. The office is in the Highlights Towers, on the 25th floor, with a view like this:

My second challenge had begun: communicating in English (well, actually it had started on the hike). I had been studying English the previous semester of my degree and felt much more prepared, but I had a reality check. In Colombia you never speak English — there is no need — so many basic words were unknown to me. I could hold a conversation but I got tangled up explaining things when I did not know the English word. Tough. It was very hard, because many people were from different parts of the world and most spoke perfect English… except me. They also had different accents. At first I had to concentrate a lot to understand what they were saying, and I would end up with a headache from the effort. Over time, I loosened up and had to put in less effort, speaking a bit better (I still have a lot to improve). Second survival tip: do not get scared and do not feel less than. Also: people were always very kind and helped me feel more confident.

Now that we knew the problem we were facing as a team, we had to start brainstorming how to attack it. There were 8 teams, each with a different problem and different sponsoring companies. These problems are genuinely hard to wrap your head around — a thousand ideas come to mind, and picking a single solution took two months of the program, including research, interviews, team discussions, many pivots, restarts from scratch, etc. This part is crucial because DPS teaches us to focus on the user; every step must follow what the user really needs and wants.

In parallel with the team work, DPS provides different workshops depending on the milestones for each week (agile development), many of them on how to work as a team and specific to each track (SE, AI, IxD, PM).

The last month was the most fun for me, because we were finally entering the development phase :-D. It was my first time working with people from different disciplines, and it was a relief. While the Product Managers were bringing new ideas or modifying the ones we had based on user feedback and understanding, the Interaction Designer turned those ideas into beautiful designs, and I as a Software Engineer together with my Artificial Intelligence teammate handled the software.

To choose the technology I would work with, I made a list of possible mobile stacks and discussed it with one of the SE leads. We found some pros and cons of each, and he advised me to pick one and time-box it: if in two days max I could not even set up the system to use it, the recommendation would be to switch. In the end I picked React Native, since the SE leads had worked with React and the official guide made it easy. Survival tip: Always discuss every step with the SE leads and your pair programmer.

Inside our team we had a few problems — one member left the program (bad luck for me, he was an SE), another was sick for a month, then I was also sick.

Every Friday all groups had a workshop called Retros where we focused on communicating what was good and what was bad about the team. Another tip: Communication and friendship within the team is essential — great teams develop great ideas. In the end we had a great result, and despite all the team trouble we never lost momentum or gave up. We got praised for the advanced state of the product and for our attitude.

Finally, I want to show how many people (by country) have attended the program — as you can see, very few from Latin America. I am the first person from Colombia, but I do not want to be the last :-).

I recommend this experience because, beyond learning how things work at a real company and how startups operate, you discover beautiful places, meet people from all over the world, strengthen your English, learn German (a little, in my case), get to know different companies you could work at, encounter different cultures, and compare them with our country — generating a broader perspective and learning how to apply the good parts of those cultures to ours.

Thanks DPS for this great experience. I hope many more Colombians can attend the program and represent our beautiful country with pride.

Some costs

• Train/bus monthly pass -> 66.60 Euros (zones 1 to 3)

• Hyperspace stay 550 Euros per month (services included) + 100 Euros deposit

• Food at Daily (restaurant near the office) -> Between 6 and 10 Euros, depending on the day

• Cell phone plan 3 GB -> 15 Euros