Apprenticeships at Monday

As a Hamburg-based company, we see it as our duty to not only live out and live up to the traditional Hanseatic values but also to pass them on to future generations. Above all, we honor the values of reliability, quality and strong partnerships. And we also want our future experts to enjoy the sheer pleasure of a job well done.

Last year, Monday therefore decided to take on apprentices for the first time in its ten-year history. The company immediately identified three candidates, thirsty for new knowledge and looking to train as IT specialists in application development.

On 1 August 2019, Franziska, Lennart and Finn started their apprenticeships at Monday. And their previous career experience could not have been more different. While Franziska had already completed vocational training as a notary clerk and gained some initial experience in the field, Lennart had first enrolled as a student in geoinformatics before then deciding to apply for the apprenticeship at Monday and Finn came to us straight from school. But one thing they did have in common: all of them enjoyed coding and acquiring new skills.

After about 10 months at Monday, we wanted to know what the trio thought about their apprenticeships here so far and so we invited them to take part in an interview.

What does your daily routine look like at Monday? Is it any different to how you imagined your apprenticeship would be?

“All three of us are currently working on a new dashboard for our office and preparing to take the first Java 11 certification exam,” explains Franzi. “I’d imagined that there’d always be a supervisor sitting next to us—and keeping an eye on us all the time! But it’s really cool actually that we’re allowed to work independently and at our own speed. Especially because we each can offer such a different skillset.”

“We’re using new development technologies and coding together,” Lennart adds. “And if we get stuck at any point, we can always talk to one of our colleagues. Everyone takes the time to answer our questions properly.”

What do you most like about your apprenticeship?

Finn: “We get to be a part of real customer projects.” Lennart agrees immediately.

And Franzi nods her approval: “It’s great we get a chance to build up our expertise independently here but I’m also looking forward to the day when we contribute production code to a customer project!”

On that point, it seems, everyone can agree.

And a key question for Monday: if you could change anything about your apprenticeship, what would it be?

Absolute silence.

“Well, as trainees at Monday, we are also involved in decisions about our apprenticeship. So that’s why there’s nothing we want to change about it,” Franzi explains.

Although Lennart does then think of something: “I’d really like to be able to complete the Java 11 certification more quickly. But I guess Monday has no real say on that score.”

“Anyway, if we think of anything you could improve at Monday, we’ll be sure to let you know,” says Finn, to general amusement.

So we’ll wait and see whether our trainees do have anything they’d like done differently.

One final question: we’d like to know how you’d describe Monday in just three words.

Franziska: “Challenging but fun!”

Finn: “My second family.”

Lennart: “Good being here!”

What a fantastic set of answers!

Thanks to all of you for this virtual interview. And we hope that your apprenticeships at Monday continue to be as much fun as we’re having being your trainers. All of us at Monday are keeping our fingers crossed for your Java 11 certification!