5 questions for Youssef

Software Engineer at Zalando. In Berlin since 2016

Berlin street scene. Youssef works in a nicer place.

Hi Youssef, nice to meet you. Who are you?

Youssef in Berlin

• My name is Youssef, I am 33 years old
• I am married and have 2 kids.
• I am from Cairo
• I graduated with a Bachelor in Computer Science from Helwan University. in 2007

What do you do now?

• I live in Berlin since 2016
• I build digital payment products at Zalando Payments

Tell us a fun fact about yourself

• I was actually not a great student!
• I focused my efforts on a graduation project. As part of a team, I built a prototype for a massive MMOG which won the second place in the MIE competition

Why did you move to Germany?

• I wanted to build a leading digital product
• I wanted to work in a great engineering environment
• I wanted to learn more, and grow faster

What advice do you have for our Imagine Fellows?

• Try to work on projects for European clients or work remotely to learn the best practices and the European working style
• Do open-source projects to learn sprint planning, code reviews, CI\CD etc.
• Invest heavily in learning relevant multi-purpose languages like Python
• Prepare for the technical interviews. They are hard! Study the basics again
• Be patient & persistent. It took me nearly a year to find my job at Zalando
• Apply to a Berlin-based startup to get into the market. They always seek people like you who may not speak German but are flexible, learn fast and work hard.

Want to learn more about Youssef? Check out his Linkedin profile. Also, take a look at Youssef’s CV.

— Your friends at Imagine.

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