A Different Kind of Software Internship
Just about every computer science student undergoes an internship recruiting frenzy, full of irrelevant coding puzzles and under-the-table comparisons of who pays most massively, and whose office has the most exciting amenities. I want to believe that this disillusioned process merely overshadows students’ underlying passion for software engineering or problem solving, though I do start to wonder if that passion isn’t actually lost altogether.
I’m lucky to say that my summer experience at Ro was a complete contrast to this. A summer internship is a rare opportunity to devote three months to learning, growth, and developing relationships. To make the most of that opportunity, I’ve learned how valuable it is to determine your goals before starting. For me, doing this led me right in the direction of Ro.
Finding Ro
My own long-term goal is to build and lead organizations. I spent the previous summer building a startup in a venture accelerator, and I determined afterward that I wanted to experience working in an established startup to understand how a well-run organization operates.
I quickly realized, though, that the most interesting companies to work at for a summer had not invested in the traditional internship programs where they’d play hard-to-get at my school’s career fairs and require disheartening automated applications. I came across Ro in a list of the “happiest places to work in NYC” — a funny title that struck me as an incredible way to characterize an organization.
Given my passion for the intersection of healthcare and technology, I reached out cold with a resume and cover letter to Ro’s Director of Recruiting on LinkedIn. I was surprised to quickly receive a warm response and a connection to Chandler Moisen, who was already piloting a first-ever Summer Fellowship program at Ro. From there ensued an extensive interview process that officially landed me my summer position at Ro.
Real Responsibilities
Within the first week of my fellowship, I was given real responsibility as a contributor on my team. Thankfully, I was already comfortable in Ro’s tech stack, and before I arrived I made sure to brush up my skills in the specific frameworks I knew I would be encountering. I had a few days to become familiar with Ro’s current applications and its roadmap for upcoming projects. Then I was brought to pair with a senior software engineer on an instrumental feature within a massive new project. That’s to say, I was thrown into the deep end. Luckily for me, the engineer I was working with was unendingly willing to support me, answer my questions, and familiarize me with Ro’s approaches to architecting and implementing features. I was dropped right into a feature stampede by my second week, and I was suddenly part of the pack, sprinting like everyone else.
Being given this level of responsibility from the very beginning brought the best out of me every day. By the end of the fellowship, I surprised myself by the amount of value I was able to contribute — all thanks to Ro’s trust in me and the supportive culture around me. As an engineer at Ro, the big picture is as accessible as the smallest details. You’re not a cog in the wheel, but an instrument providing value on a massive scale, always in touch with the “why” for everything you do. Past my engineering work, I was also given the opportunity to explore and lead a new project for Ro, to gain some parallel experience in the product manager realm. I spent the last few weeks of the fellowship compiling research and developing a roadmap for a brand new product initiative. This was a stark contrast to what many of my friends were doing at their internships at other firms — something I’m glad I had no part of.
The Power of Relationships
Relationships proved to be an invaluable part of my fellowship experience. The most important ones were with my closest mentors, who helped me draw out my personal goals for the fellowship and were committed to helping me achieve them. Thanks to advice from my early mentors at Ro, I learned the importance of sharing my individual goals with everyone I met so that they could best offer their expertise for my own growth. This harkens back to the importance of spending time to define my own goals and values in order to get the most out of my summer experience
I finished my fellowship connected with dozens of incredible people throughout Ro — albeit quite challenging to really connect when meeting people remotely. After speaking with friends about their internship experiences elsewhere, I learned that not only was building relationships not a focus for them, but it didn’t even feel possible. Software internships tend to be solely focused on developing young engineers within a low-stakes sandbox, grooming talent for returning full-time. At Ro, building relationships was at the forefront of my experience. This was thanks not only to the unique freedom within Ro’s fellowship program, but also to the community of compassionate, multidimensional Ro’ers who were consistently willing to meet and connect with me.
Takeaways from Ro
Ro is a unique organization. It’s an extremely fast-paced, high-growth business, though it’s people-first, patient-first, empathy-first, and happy. I felt this since my very first interview for the fellowship — a sort of magic that left me feeling fulfilled after every interaction with others at Ro. This magic is contagious and permeates the entire organization. Ro is also built upon openness and transparency, principles which allowed me to engage with every piece of the organization, even as just a summer engineering fellow.
Ro’s organizational structure follows a fascinating model, which it calls the “team of teams.” The product and software side of Ro is not broken down into siloed engineering, product, and design groups, but rather into cross-functional “squads” with high levels of autonomy within a specific realm of the business. These squads are generally made up of a variety of engineers, a PM, a designer, and an engineering manager, who work as a collective force to solve problems from the ground up.
Throughout the summer, my squad began to implement a new product development process which integrates the entire squad, including engineers, into every piece of product development. This is a stark contrast to the traditional “waterfall” approach, where a PM and designer map out a new product and merely allow the engineers to pick up tasks to implement it. This new process empowers the entire team to be invested in all that they build, which I believe ultimately leads to a faster pace, better products, and more fulfilled employees.
I’m hoping that Ro continues to invest in product development processes like this as it expands its “team of teams” approach. And past this, I hope other organizations can learn from the magic in Ro’s culture and its commitment to openness, relentlessness, and trust. This was a different kind of “software internship,” and Ro is a different kind of organization.
