Illumination Works

Data Engineering Intern

May - August 2024 • Beavercreek, OH

What I liked

Illumination Works is a small data consultancy company that was founded in 2006. I worked as a Data Engineer/Data Scientist at the company and was tasked with using and scoring named entity recognition (NER) models in Python. I was also a part of a team, so I had to research, attend meetings, and work with peers on a number of tasks. The company has an excellent onboarding process, as they invite you to the office and introduce you to a number of coworkers. One of the most important things to the company is that it is a family, everyone is treated the same because you deserve to be there and have put in the work to be at the company. Between coworkers, there is excellent communication and everyone utilizes Microsoft Teams all the time. If you have questions or concerns there is always someone that can help you. Another great thing was if you needed time off, the managers are very understanding and in most cases will grant the time off. There are lots of things that the company does extremely well.

What I wish was different

For me, there is not many things that I wish would have been different. From the very beginning, they were upfront on what I would be tasked with and did not give me anything too easy or difficult. One thing I wish would have been different was more people at the office. After quarantine in 2020, the company changed to almost entirely remote, and downscaled the office space they held. As a result, most people work from home and do not go to the office to work, which took some getting used to. Other than that, the company is ran very well and does not need changing!

Advice

The company has an excellent library of resources available for their employees, that can be used at any time. I did not use these resources from the very beginning, and I regret not using them because there is tons of great information. Another important thing I learned is that everyone is willing and ready to answer a question you have, or point you in the right direction. I got stuck quite a few times while working and at first I would not seek out help, I would spend too much time trying to figure it out myself.

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