[Monday Motivation] Meet Gunasundari, a small-town girl from Tamil Nadu who coded her way to success

Gunasundari comes from a humble family in Thanjavur city in Tamil Nadu. A topper in both school and college, she always wanted to learn coding and explore and know more about emerging technologies. She says, she aspires to learn something more ‘creative and innovative’.

Her father, who runs a vegetable shop along with his brother, supported Gunasundari to pursue engineering to ensure an enriching career.

“My father always wanted me to be a software developer,” says the 21-year-old.

Getting started

Despite being one of the largest cities in Tamil Nadu, Thanjavur had very limited opportunities to access the kind of technical knowledge Gunasundari aspired to. A first-generation learner from her family, she was pursuing BTech in Electronics and Communications Engineering at Government college of Engineering, Thanjavur.

While her college offered an introductory class on python, a programming language, which she was excited about, she says there were no specific courses in the curriculum to provide specialised training to interested students.

During her final year in college, she enrolled in Tech Saksham--a program aimed to empower women with skills of the future and encourage them towards tech careers. Students who successfully complete the program are given course completion certificates and placement/internship assistance.

Describing the reason behind learning coding, Gunasundari says, “Executing a program code without an error in the first go makes me happy.”

Gunasundari cracked her first perfect code during her first class with TechSaksham, and thus began her journey in the tech space. She also managed to excel at web designing, her tract of choice among the three courses offered at TechSaksham.

In just six months, she learnt the technical know-how of Web Designing through experiential learning under the guidance of TechSaksham mentors and industry experts.

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Coding her journey

Gunasundari gained professional knowledge after six months of weekly classes, expert workshops on upcoming technologies, and soft skill/employability training. During her classes she was given practical exercises to improve her skills.

As the next step, she started preparing for the possible employment opportunities and went through assessments, mock interviews, and was provided with additional academic resources to prepare for placement interviews. The employability training sessions taught her how to conduct herself in a professional interview and provided her with the ease of communicating her knowledge.

Her hard work and dedication paid off, and she soon secured two job offers--first one by Ernst & Young through TechSaksham placement drives, and second by Capgemini through campus placements.

It has been a dream come true for her and her entire family as she is the first-generation learner and now going to be associated with a global organisation.

Gunasundari shares that her family was initially speculative of her achievements and came to terms with her calibre only later.

“My family did not believe me after I got my first job offer. It was only after the second offer letter that they accepted that I have made it,” she says.

They are excited about the opportunities offered to me and are confident in my capabilities now to grow as a tech professional more than ever before. Additionally, I have convinced them to let me relocate to a Tier-I city if required,” Gunasundari adds.

As an undercurrent of the skills acquired during this course, she has found herself to be more comfortable with technology and finds herself exploring different courses offered on emerging technologies by Microsoft and SAP.

An eldest sibling living in the joint family, she has now become a role model not just to her siblings, but her entire community.