From what I have observed over the past two months, the Czech Republic defines “success” as a hard worker who contributes well to the team. For the most part, the office culture here tends to be very focused. As soon as we get to work, everyone focuses on their individual projects and the office is usually silent. Then, at lunch we talk consistently for a whole hour. Afterwards, everyone goes back to focusing wholeheartedly on their own work. Despite a lot of individual work being done, I still feel like this is more of a collaborative environment than a data team in the US would be.
I have my own project so I have not actively worked on a team here, but I can observe the team attitude in my coworkers. Even though everyone is focusing on their own work, people are in and out of meetings all day working together. Overall, I feel like the interactions between coworkers tend to be more collaborative. I feel that in the United States, especially in corporate America, everyone is trying to carve their own path and are often pushed into competition with their own coworkers. However this is not the case in the Czech Republic. None of my coworkers are competing with other coworkers. Additionally, the head of the data team is extremely nice and not what I had anticipated when I heard I would be joining a data team. I expected him to be super serious but he is often joking around with other coworkers despite being our boss.
A similarity I have noticed between the United States and the Czech Republic is that the lines between work/life balance can sometimes bleed. I have not had to work overtime, but my coworkers have mentioned working on projects over the weekend or after work hours. However, I am uncertain if this is the culture of the country, company, or data team.
My favorite part of the data team culture has been how friendly everyone is. Every day at 11:30 am, we go out to lunch together. This started on my first day here and I had assumed that this was just their way of welcoming me into the office. Well, two months later, I still have not gotten lunch alone once. With this being my first internship, I can’t accurately compare it to company culture in the United States, but I think I can assume that this is not a common thing back home. I imagine corporate America, especially the tech industry, to be a very intimidating environment. My experience here has been the furthest from that. Everyone has been extremely friendly. As soon as I got to this job, I had to learn how to use a new software and Python library, and this took me a few days to adjust to. I was originally super stressed, but my supervisors were understanding that it would take awhile to adapt to a new software. I continued getting nervous whenever a task took a long time to do, but time and time again my supervisors were super understanding that I was still learning how to use Streamlit. Additionally, they always give me recognition when I do well on a project. I heard a quote once, “Americans live to work, Europeans work to live” and I believe that all of these nice gestures prove this. All of my coworkers and bosses do not want to make work more stressful than it has to be. Yes there are deadlines, but at the end of the day we are all people just trying our best. Overall, I was very lucky to get placed at Carvago and I know I am going to miss my coworkers and the connections I’ve made here!
It’s hard to believe that my time in Prague is ending this week. I just finished up my last weekend trip last week in Barcelona! It was a super nice trip that was a mixture of sightseeing and going to the beach. On the first day, we visited the Sagrada Familia and Park Guell. The architecture of both of these were so beautiful. Then, on Saturday, we spent the entire day at Barceloneta beach. Then we got back early on Sunday so I had time to unwind before returning to work after a long weekend. Overall, it was a really great trip.
I know I am going to miss being able to travel so easily. Nevertheless, I am also excited to go home and see my friends and family again. However, that is going to have to wait because after this program I am going to Switzerland! I am solo traveling there for a week after the program and I am super excited. I am a bit nervous to be going alone, especially in regards to the hostel situation, but I know the experience will be worth it. I’m planning on spending a lot of time in Lucerne. After spending the summer in various cities, I am excited to get out into nature for a bit before heading home.
Above: Park Güell
Above: Sunset boat tour in Barcelona
Above: Me and my bosses at Carvago