From India to Portugal and Portugal to the Netherlands

Sumit was born in India and is a traveler by heart. By age 27 he moved to Portugal to continue his career in IT. After working in Porto for a year, he signed at Neotalent and started working for Conclusion Enablement while living in Porto. His schooling and working experience in India prepared him just right for this new adventure. With a kind smile he answers all of my questions.

27 januari 2025   |   Blog   |   Door: Conclusion Enablement

Deel

Sumit standing in a park in the Netherlands with a banner with a quote that says:  "I'm open to settle down anywhere."

I came to Portugal last year. This was a pretty big transition, from one culture to another. But I really like to interact with different kinds of people, so having colleagues from the Netherlands is nice. Sometimes it is tough to do all the interactions online, but luckily we have the monthly collaboration days in Lisbon as well. These days we get together at the main office and are able to meet physically. I even met some of the Dutch colleagues who came for the onboarding. That was really nice.

What is your technical experience?

My schooling and graduation was all in India. When I finished school I started working at a technical company there. Later I changed companies and had the chance to work in Portugal. After that I started working for a Portuguese company and now recently I started with Neotalent. I have been working for 7 years now and the last 1,5 here in Portugal.

I’m working as an engineer. I have a similar background in both Azure and DevOps. I have worked with several tools, such as Terraform, Docker, GitHub and some more. In the previous company, I worked as an Azure Product Engineer and led the team. I think this experience will help me here. I am always eager to learn and the people in my team are very intelligent and they all have a different skillset. In this way we can learn from each other.

It doesn’t take long for me, to feel comfortable somewhere else.

Sumit Argawal

What was the transition like, working for an Indian company, then Portuguese, then Dutch?

Initially I was having a little bit of a challenge. Here it is just totally different than where I come from. Indian food, Indian culture, the way we are living… just very different. But the best thing here, is the people. They’re all very welcoming. Though, they don’t speak English much and I wasn’t able to speak Portuguese. I still don’t, but we use Google Translate to understand each other. It took a moment, but now I am a lot more comfortable here in Porto. It doesn’t take long for me, to feel comfortable somewhere else.

Looks like you are an easy traveler then, is that true?

Yeah, with any other thing than food, I would definitely say that. I’m a vegetarian, so the big trouble was getting vegetarian options here. If you go out for food, there just isn’t much on the menu. I started exploring many places and now I’m ok.  

How was your onboarding at Conclusion Enablement?

The onboarding was really good. We had a 3 day session in the Lisbon office and also Steffan was there from the Dutch colleagues. We had lunch and watched a football match. The European Championship was that month. To be honest, I was not much of a football fan. India is the country of cricket, so watching this game together was new to me. After that I started watching football as well. It’s a good game!

How did you experience the kick off in your new team?

Working in the Azure team was quite convenient. Initially it was just onboarding stuff, access and everything. After that I joined the project and started working. It went well. The support I received was quite good and I’m enjoying my time so far. I haven’t learned many Dutch words, but I can say hello. Last year I went to the Netherlands and I learned some new words then. But within the team, we speak English.

Did you experience a culture shock?

In India, we don’t have much interaction with management or have one-on-one time with our managers or HR. That’s the best thing I have been observing here. We have regular meetings now and if there’s an issue or any challenge we can discuss it. I really like that about Conclusion, they care about the employees.

I have a growing mentality and my goals and thoughts are quite clear to me.

Sumit Argawal

Do you know where you’d like your career to go?

Definitely! I have a plan and conveyed it in the first meeting when I was having my interview. I’m looking forward to the long term goal of being an Azure Architect. Working at Conclusion Enablement will help me because I have the chance to learn from other, skilled architects. I have a growing mentality and my goals and thoughts are quite clear to me. That’s how I generally live.

Will you come to the Netherlands, if the opportunity is there?

I would definitely like to visit. I’m kind of a travel freak. Only last year I have been to 6 countries, including the Netherlands. But to see my colleagues physically, have lunch with them, see where they work, where they sit… to see the environment and meet people… That would be really great. I would like to see what the Conclusion office looks like. So that’s definitely the plan. If I get the opportunity I would even be open to move. I’m open to settle down anywhere.

What should people know about you?

If they want to know anything about India, they can reach out to me. Other than that I am a travel freak and sports lover. Obviously the sports are different in India, but they can ask me about that too. I’m always open for anything! Also if people just want to connect, they’re welcome to.

 

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