Raaghavendar Karthikeyan
Hometown: I’m a third culture kid originally born in India but moved to the UAE when I was a few months old, and then grew up in Qatar until I was 18.
Alma Mater: Purdue University
Major: Computer Science
Current Role: Associate Software Engineer (Chicago)
When did you start the MDP program and what was your role?
I started the Morningstar Development Program the during summer of 2017 and my first role was as a Kafka/API developer on Data Services – APIv2.
What was your next position? What led you to this role?
I moved out to the Software Architecture office recently to be a full stack developer for a new perspective on Morningstar’s technology stack and wanting to see the bigger picture.
What is a typical day in your current role?
We have stand-up at 10 a.m. every day, and I spend the rest of the day working on complex software problems, whether it is data streaming or complex data that needs currency conversion.
Did you participate in any stretch projects or ERGs?
I participated in a couple of stretch projects: one with the Talent & Culture Team to assess the MDP Health Program and one to map important data between complex systems. I’m also an MDP Ambassador for Morningstar.
What advice would you give your first-year self?
I would say network, network, network! There are some really knowledgeable people at Morningstar, and everyone is more than happy to sit down and talk to you, whether it be the CTO or directors. You can talk to people and pivot your path at Morningstar as you like.
What is your favorite Netflix binge?
My favorite Netflix binge is Friends. I’ve probably watched the show 7 times over.
Raj Surana
Hometown: Kolkata, India
Alma Mater: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Major: Computer Science and Statistics; Minor in Mathematics
Current Role: Associate Software Engineer (Chicago)
When did you start the MDP program and what was your role?
I started working at Morningstar as a Tech MDP in September 2018. In my first role, I was a QA in the Fixed-Income Services Team under Data Services. I was also fortunate enough to contribute in development work on the same team.
What was your next position? What led you to this role?
After getting a taste of QA and back-end development in my first role, I wanted to try out front-end development, as I had never really done that before. When such an opportunity came my way, I wasted no time in grabbing it. I met with the hiring manager of my current team (Managed Portfolios) even before the opening was officially posted and interviewed with the team shortly after. My current role is as a full-stack developer, with more focus towards front-end. We use technologies like NodeJS, Vue, and .NET.
What is a typical day in your current role?
My team has a 15 minute stand-up at 9:45 a.m., after which I’m mostly working on tickets until noon. More often than not, I have lunch with my fellow MDP friends (not all colleagues), though sometimes I have lunch with my team. On Wednesdays and Thursdays, we have a few scrum meetings. Apart from that, I continue with my sprint work.
Did you participate in any stretch projects or ERGs?
I worked on an AI/ML stretch project with my current team along with another MDP. We have to provide the team with actionable insights on their proposal data.
(Fun Fact: I started this stretch project long before I thought of moving to this team).
What advice would you give your first-year self?
If I could advise former-self, I would say, “You’re luck to have been put into a new team as their first QA. You have the opportunity to leave behind a legacy, so don’t be afraid – it’ll all work out well. Learn as many technologies as you can during your time as an MDP. The people at this company are extremely helpful, so you’re definitely going to get it right if you work hard enough.”
What is your best travel story?
After graduating from UIUC last summer, I went on a road trip to Italy with two of my best high school friends. Having not seen them in years (one was studying in Singapore and the other in London), this was a great time to catch up with them. We did lots of cool activities like skydiving, swimming in the middle of a lake, driving a sports car through the Tuscan vineyards, and trying to become wine connoisseurs. We plan on going to Masai Mara next, but none of us are sure when that’s going to happen.
Ankita Tank
Hometown: Mumbai, India
Alma Mater: University of Illinois at Chicago
Major: Computer Science
Current Role: Associate Software Engineer with Direct Cloud (Chicago)
When did you start the MDP program and what was your role?
I started as an Associate QA Engineer Individual Investor (Morningstar.com) on September 24th 2018.
What was your next position? What led you to this role?
In my current role, I decided to pursue full stack development with Direct Cloud. As this is one of the biggest products at Morningstar and one of the products with new product development opportunities.
What is a typical day in your current role?
My morning starts with stand-up, where team members give daily updates on the tasks they are working on and address any blockers. Following that, I work on the story/bugs I have been assigned. Some days of the week, we have sprint planning, backlog grooming, retro, etc. Besides that, there are also times where a senior developer and I form the teams to program on a story/bug.
Did you participate in any stretch projects or ERGs?
My current stretch project, organizing the MDP 2020 Hackathon, allows me to network across Morningstar and is a great chance to be recognized.
What advice would you give your first-year self?
I would have to say I could have networked better and not just stuck to learning skills for my product. But better late than never!
What is your favorite Netflix binge?
It would have to be The Office.
Urviben Patel
Hometown: Gujarat, India
Alma Mater: University of Illinois at Chicago
Major: Computer Science
Current Role: Associate Software Engineer (Full-Stack) (Chicago)
When did you start the MDP program and what was your role?
I started the Morningstar Development Program on February 11, 2019 as an Associate Software Engineer with the Site Reliability (SRE) Team. My roles and responsibilities included:
- Ensuring system reliability by identifying key points of failure along with automating system monitoring for warning & critical thresholds
- Troubleshooting new issues and automating resolutions for known types of application failures
- Creating automated feedback cycles to promote best practices across teams through the identification of the common patterns and anti-patterns
- Reducing alert fatigue by implementing a monitoring strategy that reliably identifies unique points of failure and can broadcast alert to affected teams
- Improving the ability of first line support to resolve issues by building tools that empower them to better understand the system from both the users’ and the developers’ perspectives
- Simplifying our systems by identifying and removing unused legacy systems
What was your next position? What led you to this role?
My next exciting and current position is being a Full-Stack Developer with the Product Capabilities Team for MaaS/Devsite. I always wanted to learn hands on front/back end coding. While working on a stretch project with the MPA Team in Workplace, I realized that there is so much more than just to code that I want to learn to be a better Software Developer. This led me to the role of Full-Stack Developer and every day, I am learning new methodologies and techniques to code efficiently. I am so very grateful to my team.
What is a typical day in your current role?
A typical day in my current role would start with grabbing 2 glasses of water from the tea-point to my desk…just kidding!
We are a team of 5 members here in Chicago, made up of a Manager/Architect/Developer (all in one), Senior Software Developer, Software Developer, Senior Business Analyst, and me. Every day at 10 a.m., we have our stand-up meeting where we discuss the progress of the sprint, blockers, and their solutions. We also have photo Fridays where we begin our stand-up by sharing personal pictures and stories behind them; it really helps us connect and grow as a team. After the stand-up we get back to our work and there are lot of discussions and pair programming going on to make sure everyone is feeling productive and sharing their opinions. I enjoy my lunch time with Morningstar colleagues where we discuss work as well share casual, fun conversations. After lunch, it’s like the first half of the day, which includes working individually and pairing up as and when needed.
Did you participate in any stretch projects or ERGs?
In the first month of joining Morningstar, I joined the Women in Tech (WIT) ERG. This is the beauty of Morningstar’s work culture. I feel everyone is so welcoming and excited to have you on board. Being in WIT, I had the opportunity to volunteer for the City-Wide Job Shadow Day where 10 high school girls visited Morningstar and helped us in arranging a successful workshop on creating mobile apps. Soon after, I got an opportunity to conduct the Finch Robotics Workshop with a few other colleagues, thereby representing Morningstar at Women Who Code GirlCon2019 held at Google’s Chicago office.
And here comes the month of September: I cannot thank Morningstar, my manager, and my colleagues enough for giving me this exciting opportunity to attend GHC.
Soon after I started, I had a discussion with my manager as to what expectations my team had for me, and he was cognizant about the goals for me to be a better Software Developer. I started networking more with managers and developers, and that’s how I finally met my mentor Piyali Kamra. She gauged my curiosity and introduced me to Mr. Kostya Katz (then manager of the MPA Team). Being an amazing person, Mr. Katz allowed me to be a part of his team, where I used to shadow and pair program with the software developers 2 days per week. This gave me a lot of exposure in terms of the Morningstar coding standards and Agile practices. And it is because of this stretch project, I wanted to expand my horizons and work on full-stack technology.
What advice would you give your first-year self?
For this, I think the people around me can be the best judge since I am still in my first year. But if I had to mention one thing, I think it would be to be more confident and trust myself.
What is your favorite Netflix binge?
My favorite Netflix binge is Friends.
Morningstar Development Program 