Au Revoir Zoho ❤️

For everyone, their first job holds a special place in their heart, in one way or another. It gives them that first step into the future they once only dreamed of.

And for me, that place is Zoho – the company that gave me my first job, helped me take that first step on the ladder I always wanted to climb, and brought me closer to the dreams I had always carried with me.

Now, it’s time for me to take that second step.

After an incredible journey of nearly four years (3 years and 8 months), I am finally saying goodbye to Zoho.

January 2023

I joined Zoho on January 18th, 2023.

I still remember feeling equally thrilled and overwhelmed by the sheer size of the workplace and its unique working culture. Everything felt new, unfamiliar, and exciting at the same time.

And, of course, I couldn’t leave out one of the perks that made Zoho even more memorable – the free food!

With three meals provided for employees every day, I inevitably put on a few extra kilos along the way. Back then, I didn’t even know what calories were. Now, well... I’ve got them under control! 😄

Friendships

When I joined, my only goals were simple: work hard, clear my probation, and hopefully make some friends as I stepped into this brand-new stage of my life.

Somehow, I managed to do both.

A Full-Stack Developer (I assumed through my college projects) slowly transitioned into a Database enthusiast.

And along the way, I found a wonderful set of friends with whom I loved spending most of my time – spending time chitchatting in pantries, having evening snacks, watch movies in conference rooms (not that many though), going out, or simply hanging around and doing absolutely nothing.

Even today I randomly remembers the conversations we had in Tower pantries, watching series while having lunch at the South Plaza tent, the food the guys bought from the home, and all those random conversations over the evening snacks.
Those seemingly ordinary moments are the memories I’ll carry with me!! ❤️

The Engineer I Became

At some point, I realised I needed to take my work more seriously – thanks to the gentle nudge from my manager about not taking work seriously enough. 😄

From that moment until this very day, I have worked hard, made meaningful contributions to the product and the projects I was part of, and learned so much about databases, especially PostgreSQL. I learned from my mentors, my teammates, and, at times, from my own mistakes.

I also got the opportunity to mentor two juniors. Looking back, I think I handled that responsibility better than I would have expected from myself – or at least, that’s what I’d like to believe.

They’re probably the ones who can tell whether that's actually true.. :)

And somewhere along the way, my interests started changing too. Instead of thinking about building full-stack web applications, I found myself increasing interested in building tools and projects that could make working with databases easier and better.

It eventually went so far that I started writing blogs and posting them like it was a war. 😅

Personal Growth

But, as life usually does, things started changing along the way.

Some friendships slowly faded – some because of my own mistakes, and some simply because we stopped being able to keep in touch. There wasn’t always a dramatic ending or maybe there is. Sometimes, people just slowly became a little more distant.

And somewhere in between all of that, I entered what I now call my solo-life phase. I started going to movies alone, sitting in cafés by myself, reading books, and, most importantly, learning to enjoy my own company.

Looking back, that phase helped me grow in ways I didn’t realise at the time. I became more comfortable with myself, more independent, and perhaps a little more mature. Ironically, learning to be comfortable alone also helped me find new people, make new friends, and, most importantly, feel secure in my own company.

Games

Zoho introduced me to games I had barely played before – Foosball and Table Tennis – and somehow made me fall a little more in love with Badminton.

I still remember the first time, I played foosball, the only thing I know is to rotate the player in full circle and hit the ball with complete randomness. 😂

What started as something to do during breaks slowly became one of the ways I spent a lot of my time at Zoho – enough to make me sweat even with the A/C running throughout the building. 😄

Interestingly, many of the friends I made during the later part of my journey came through these games. Some started as people I played with, some gradually became closer friends, and some became people I genuinely enjoyed spending time with outside the game as well.

Looking back, the games were never just about winning or losing. Well, sorry, in my case, it was definitely about winning! 😄

But more than anything, they gave me a reason to meet people, spend time together, laugh at each other’s terrible shots, and, somewhere between all of that, build friendships.

Things I Didn't Know I Had to Learn

When I first started, I thought being a developer was mostly about writing code. I slowly realised that writing code was only a small part of it.

There were hours spent debugging issues in the source code, trying to understand why something that looked perfectly fine on the surface was behaving completely differently underneath.

There were production issues that needed to be analysed, countless lines of source code to go through, and documentation that had to be written and maintained – things I probably didn't think much about when I first imagined what being a developer would be like.

And then came the never-ending meetings and discussions. 😄 Some were about solving problems, some were about understanding problems, and some somehow led to discussions about other problems we didn't even know existed!

But somewhere in all of this, I learned that being an engineer isn't just about writing code.

It's about understanding a problem before trying to solve it, asking the right questions, digging deeper when the obvious answer isn't the right one, documenting what you learn, and being able to explain your thinking to others.

Those were things I didn't know I had to learn when I joined Zoho. Looking back, they probably shaped me just as much as the code I wrote.

And finally, I want to thank everyone who has been a part of this incredible journey.

To my mentors and teammates who helped me grow.

To my friends who made ordinary days memorable.

To everyone I crossed paths with along the way.

Thank you.

I may not remember every project, meeting, or line of code, but I’ll always remember the people, the conversations, the laughter, the games, the lessons, and the moments that made these nearly four years special.

And heads up – even after saying all this, I won’t be the one to ping first. 🤪

GOOD BYE, ZOHO!! ❤️