Why I joined Amplication.

It was afternoon here in India. I was writing a thread for my Twitter account, as usual, and was about to post it. Just then I got a notification on my mobile phone. After reading the message I was on cloud nine. It said, “Congratulations, after rounds of interviews and assignments we found you as a perfect match for the role. You are selected!”. I was blank for a moment and it took me a few minutes to realize that I had got my first job in the field of “Code, Content, and Community”.

Every job changing decision includes a set of critical criteria for an individual. It's been more than a month since I made the decision to join Amplication as a “Community Manager'' and I thought it would be good to share with the community how I came to this decision and what my experience has been since then.

Amplication is not a Company, It is a Community!

Amplication has more than 8000 open source developers on various platforms like Discord, Twitter, Linkedin, Dev, and Github.

Such a huge community has developers across the globe with different technology sets and experiences, contributing to a single cause which is “Just code what matters”.

Amplication is working on making the life of developers easier by introducing a devtool that can make the backend of web applications in a few minutes.

When did I get to know about Amplication?

I discovered Amplication through my Twitter account back in June, when I was working as a Full Stack developer in India.

When I got to know about Amplication, my first reaction was “Why didn't I know about this tool before? :( ”.

I mean, who doesn't want to skip the irritating part of the code when doing the repetitive tasks of creating the backend. I know it's the pain point in the process of development for many of us and this is solved by Amplication.

I joined their Discord server in June and started interacting with the developers there. I found the community to be very supportive and helpful. Whenever I got stuck anywhere I just had to ask the community- “Hey I got stuck at XYZ point. Please help!” and many people were there to help.

Starting Contributions

Many people think that contributing to an open-source project is just about contributing to the code base of that product.

But this is not the case. There are many things you can do to contribute to an open-source project without doing coding-

1. Be a user

The best way to contribute to an open-source project is to be a user of that product.

Start using the product and give feedback to the moderators so that the product can be improved for the whole community.

2. Docs

There are many documents in any project, such as readme, and the official documentation of the product to which anyone can contribute by improving them or translating into any language which isn’t available.

3. Tutorials

You can make tutorials whether in the form of Blogs or videos.

This can be a very supportive step to any open-source project because you are educating the whole community about that project.

This will also give you the best knowledge about the product.

4. Spread the word!

Share the article, blog, or anything you’ve done with the product, on social media.

Share your experience on how helpful the product is and how it is beneficial for anyone in the same field as yours.

This helps any open-source project to grow.

My Contributions

When I joined the community, I learned about the product and got to know why Amplication is so useful for developers like me.

I saw that there were not many written tutorials about any project made using Amplication. So, I thought, why not make one project using Amplication?

I decided to make a project “Markdown Blog Application using ReactJs and Amplication” and write a detailed tutorial that includes every step of making the project.

In this process, Yuval(CEO, Amplication) helped me a lot, which shows how serious Amplication is for the support they give to the users. He was available whenever I asked him anything.

I decided to share that blog with my audience on Twitter as well as with the whole community on Discord. I got a very warm response from the community (and obviously some awesome swags from Amplication :P)

Link to the blog- https://medium.com/@sauain/make-a-markdown-blog-using-amplication-and-reactjs-8bec5e59fdc3

How did I get to know about the job offer?

After sharing that blog, I was an active member of the community and shared my thoughts about Amplication many times.

I was also in contact with the moderators of Amplication and shared with them the feedback I got from my audience on Twitter.

So after being a contributor and an active member of the community for three months, at the end of October, I was approached by Yuval(CEO, Amplication) about a job opening at Amplication.

The job opening was “Community Manager” and was for someone:

Who loves to work with communities.
Who makes content around the product.
Who can advocate for the product and share the word.

I found the job description to be a very good fit for me and I applied for the interview.

Interview process

The interview process was smooth and included only three rounds.

In the first round, I was given a home assignment from which they could assess my skills. The best part of this round is that the assignment they give to you is paid, or you’ll be given gift vouchers whether you are selected or not.

The second round was the technical round about the role and expectations from the role.

The third and final round was a discussion with the CEO regarding the goals of the role and a discussion about how I’ll manage it.

After waiting for a week, I got the result, and guess what- I was selected. Yay!

Onboarding

The onboarding date was the 22nd of November, 2021. It started with a meeting with Yuval, telling me all about the current goals, and giving me access to the required tools.

That meeting was followed the next day by a meeting with the whole team where I was introduced to everyone. Obviously, if you’re planning to join Amplication, Matan Shidlov (VP of Engg, Amplication) will ask you to tell them the most important thing about you, which is, for sure, “What is your favorite animal?”.

I received everything I requested for installing a setup in my home office. From the latest Macbook to the split keyboard I loved most.

Picture of my setup-

Working Culture and My Experience

In Amplication, there are growing teams for Engg, Community and Content, Marketing, HR, DevRel, and many more.
Working in an environment where we have professionals for everything is always a good thing. Work is well divided among all the teams. There is a collaboration between the teams on a regular basis at different opportunities.

There are weekly team meets where we share our weekly goals and a One:One with our manager every week. Besides the meets, team members are always available to help. I’ve learned so much in the past month from my teammates.

The goals are decided by ourselves and we are given full ownership of our role. You’ve to decide your own goals each week and work towards them.

I found Amplication to be a company that thinks about their employees and believes open-source can change the world.

Amplication is a Remote-Okay company and I was the first employee to work remotely in Amplication. It is an amazing experience.

This is my first job in the field of Three C’s- Code, Content, and Communities and after a month working at Amplication, I can proudly say that it is one of the best career decisions I’ve made in my life.