The CISCO High School Shadow Experience
This summer (July 10–28, 2017), I had the opportunity to participate in Cisco’s San Jose’s high school job shadow program as a Hardware/Software Engineer Intern. This was perfect for me given my interest in computer science and engineering. I knew that Cisco was a pioneer in the networking industry, and I was excited to learn more about Cisco, its hardware and software development processes, and work culture. By the end of the program, I hoped to get good exposure on how Cisco creates devices like routers and switches and how they roll them out from idea conception to production. However, now, three weeks later, I have gained so much more.
My Key Takeaways
The Cisco shadow experience was more than just learning about the specific projects and devices that our mentors showed us each day on the job. As interns, we got to experience life as Cisco employees. Here are the biggest things I noticed.
- Cisco’s new slogan — The Network. Intuitive. I saw this slogan all around campus along with this image and it was really powerful. With this branding, Cisco has unveiled the network of the future that can learn, adapt, and evolve. This slogan and brand has also come with Cisco’s heightened involvement in IoT and to be core part of it. Seeing that technology can now actually think for itself is really impressive and always reminds me of the immense power of the Internet.
- Growing data consumption rates. On our very first day of the program, one of our mentors told us that each year, Cisco publishes statistics on data use and device connectivity. Cisco publishes annual report for it and the report for 2016–2021 showed that annual global IP traffic will reach 3.3 Zettabytes (1 Zettabyte is 10²¹ bytes) per year by 2021. Basically, Cisco is the road constructor and highway patrol for the freeways, roads, ramps, and traffic lights of the Internet — building hardware and software for Internet freeways and making sure no one is breaking the rules. If that job wasn’t hard enough, “cars” are being manufactured at an alarming rate and people are in a rush to drive them. Cisco is constantly forced to innovate and create new hardware and software to deal with the rapidly growing number of connected devices and users as well as large volumes of data consumption.
- Software as a service. The prominence and necessity of software as a service for a network was reiterated by several Cisco employees. Many of our mentors told us that only hardware for network was no longer sustainable as Cisco’s only service — they would not make enough profit and wouldn’t scale (fast enough). For this reason, it is important for Cisco to switch to a subscription-based model where software is sold as a service instead.
What did I learn?
Our Cisco job shadow experience was divided into three main components: hardware, software, and product management/technical marketing. In each section of the program, I got authentic insight into the professional world and how people work and communicate.
Hardware
Prior to the Cisco Internship, I had had little to no experience with hardware that is core to the technology. Over the first seven days, I was able to visit countless labs and see how Cisco actually rolls out new hardware from end to end. Although I was not aware I used Cisco products on a daily (hourly!) basis, I learned that the routers, switches, and access points they create are integral to the functioning of the Internet and to the data network on my phone. Shadowing hardware engineers also gave me interesting insight into the actual problems they face. Hardware engineers at Cisco must battle the always growing data consumption rates and build devices to support the quickly growing number of connected devices on earth. Additionally, Cisco has many offices around the world, and engineers must work with all teams to meet specific release dates. Communication is key.

In addition to the job experience, the office environment was very enjoyable. The structure of the hardware program was such that each day, a mentor would take us interns and show us what he/she did. I was extremely impressed with the enthusiasm that all of our mentors showed and the fact that they took time out of their busy schedules to show us what they do. The food was also a fun part of the experience! We visited several cafeterias (all good :) ) and ate quite a few snacks as well. My time in hardware was very informative and gave me great exposure to a field that I didn’t know much about!
Software
Traditionally, high school students are more exposed to software in schools through classes like Intro to Computer Science and AP Computer Science. I was still curious as to what exactly the software team would show us, especially since many of the software engineers either do work at their desk or attend meetings for most of the day. Regardless, the software team showed us, through detailed presentations and one-on-one job shadowing, just how they work with and program hardware given to them to add to the device’s existing functionalities. The software team was quite involved in the rising prominence of IoT technologies and were very excited to show us what they were working on.

Once again, we found that our mentors were very interested in what we wanted to learn and went out of their way to explain to us and teach us what they did. Rather than making us simply watch them do work, we also learned by attempting a project on Cisco’s DevNet website. Although we were unsuccessful, we did create an extension on Google Chrome, and doing and presenting the project was an extremely informative process! The food was still good, and we really enjoyed the offices’ open space environment and seemingly endless areas with couches to relax.
Project Management/Technical Marketing
We spent the last three days with the management and technical marketing teams. The project management teams are responsible for coordinating the efforts of an entire team and making sure that a product/project is rolled out by a certain deadline. A brand’s reputation and business completely rides on these deadlines. What I realized was that there is an intense amount of communication required to ensure deadlines are met for smallest activities and projects.
As always, we met mentors who were extremely hardworking and charismatic, and who were super excited to help high schoolers ready to work and join the real world. They all introduced us to several of their colleagues, and we got to know a lot about the necessity of the project management process and team.
How did I get this internship?
Cisco already hosts this program in many of its locations across the United States, but this was its first time in San Jose! I heard about this program through my school’s newsletter. To apply, I submitted my school transcript, a 45 second video, my resume, and a teacher’s recommendation letter. I was really excited to get accepted.
Overall, the Cisco High School Job Shadow Program was such an informative and fulfilling experience, and I would definitely recommend it to any other high schooler interested in CS but unsure of how real world jobs are like. Many large companies do not offer opportunities like this to high school students, so being able to get an inside look at Cisco was a really unique experience. I would like to extend a huge thank you to Cisco for hosting this program as well as all of my mentors who really inspired with their passion for their jobs. Because of them, I now have a better understanding of what my career could be like.
