In Conversation With Maurizio Conza
We recently sat down with Maurizio Conza, Software Engineer, to discuss his experience working at Cazoo. We had a great conversation about his love for TDD and being customer-obsessed.
Q: Why did you choose to join Cazoo? What made you feel it was the right opportunity for you?
A: Cazoo is a young but growing company. It uses modern technology. They are always looking for ways to improve and they use languages I wanted to learn — JavaScript and TypeScript.
I was also keen to practice TDD. It’s one of the main things you see advertised on the job specs. At Cazoo even the interview was really TDD-focused. I use that approach every day to work and create code.
Q: Could you tell me a little bit about the team that you are part of?
A: I’m in the Consumer Finance team. I imagine this is because I’d worked for a FinTech company before and it would be the most suitable for me.
I really love how obsessed we are with our customers. Every day we review and monitor what happened the day before. If we find any problems, we will try to identify the root cause of the problem and solve it as soon as possible.
It’s really interesting to see all the journeys that the customer takes. I’d never worked on a consumer-facing product and I really love it.
Q: What have you enjoyed about being part of the consumer finance team?
A: I think I’m very lucky. I really love the people in consumer finance. They’re always keen to help. I didn’t have any experience in JavaScript, but they had the patience to support me and answer all my questions.
People in my team are very friendly and easy to approach. It’s the right environment for me.
Q: You mentioned that you wanted to work in an environment where you can learn from others? Do you feel Cazoo has lived up to that expectation?
A: We are given time away from our work to focus on learning. That’s one cool thing that I’ve never had in the past. Our managers are more than happy to give us time to learn.
We also have meetings at Cazoo that are focused on learning, like the Community of Practices. The teams take it in turn to present cool ideas and show us different ways to do things better.
Another thing they offer is the bootcamp training. That was helpful for me, especially when I was learning all about TDD practices and JavaScript. It gave me an opportunity to meet other people from other teams. The company is really focused on improving the skills of the engineers.
Q: You mentioned that you’ve had to learn JavaScript since joining, how have you found that experience?
A: It’s tough but the way we work here is focused on pair programming. It means I never feel lost. If I have any questions, I can immediately get an answer from the other person I’m working with. If I was doing it alone, I would probably spend hours on a problem before asking for help. I’m learning and I can see the progress I’ve made so far.
Q: You mentioned earlier that you wanted to practice TDD. How have you found being able to follow the TDD practice since you joined the team?
A: I love it because I can see the difference in the quality of the code. It makes you change your way of thinking completely. It helps you focus on client requirements and not just on making the test pass. It’s so powerful.
Q: Okay last question, if you were speaking to another software engineer who was considering joining Cazoo, what would your advice be to them?
A: While I’ve worked here I’ve found that there is always something new to learn. If someone is looking to become a better software engineer, every day, then this is probably the best place for them.
You also have to love dealing with customers because you have so much impact on them. There is no such thing as a stupid bug, they are all important because of the impact they could have.
If you want to learn and are customer-obsessed this is the right place for you.
If you would be interested in a career at Cazoo, then please visit our career’s page to see our open vacancies now!
