Life as an Academy Trainer at FDM

Have you ever wanted to know what a Software Development Trainer at FDM actually does? Read on to find out what a typical day at FDM looks like for me.

A little bit about myself

I am part of a team of four trainers in the FDM Academy in Frankfurt, Germany. We all have different backgrounds and experience; in my case I graduated with a Master’s degree in Physics at the Technical University of Darmstadt.

My professional career actually began as a trainee at FDM. After completing the IT Service Management programme in Frankfurt and London, I was placed at Portigon Financial Services in Düsseldorf where I stayed for three years, working in the Financial Reporting department. I was responsible for the development and support of business intelligence applications using SAS and SAP BI.

The experience of going through the FDM careers programme and being placed on-site gave me a fantastic insight into the journey of an FDM trainee, so when I joined the Frankfurt Academy as a trainer, I was really excited about the opportunity to share my knowledge and experience, and prepare the trainees for a successful career with one of our clients.

My tasks & challenges as an FDM Trainer

Being a trainer is a versatile job and I have a variety of daily tasks.

We deliver courses in the Frankfurt Academy in Software Development, Business Analysis and Project Management. This includes the foundation modules like Professional Skills, SQL, UNIX and Excel/VBA. Our courses are focused on project work, which means we not only deliver classroom based training, but also help the trainees to solve practical tasks.

As a trainer we need to have the technical knowledge, but also the ability to communicate and explain the topics to trainees from various educational backgrounds. Depending on their background our trainees have different areas in which they need our help. Our challenge is to help all of them on their road to a successful career in IT.

When we are not delivering a course, it’s a good chance for us to develop our knowledge in an area or improve the delivery of a course. We also consult our sales team on technical topics or advise them about the skills and strengths of our trainees and consultants The trainers are also involved in the assessment process for new candidates joining the FDM trainee programme. This involves assisting our recruitment team in finding and evaluating case studies. The combination of interacting with people from different backgrounds and the possibility to work with interesting and challenging technologies makes our job fun.

In May, the first Java Development course is going to take place in Frankfurt. I am currently preparing for the Object Oriented Development and Java courses with the help of our colleagues in the UK. The course is focused on good design practices and development methods (SOLID, Design Patterns and TDD) and has modules on database connections, web development and SPRING.

For this course we are looking for someone with strong problem solving skills, an analytical mind-set an interest in software development and strong communication and presentation skills.

If you have software development experience and are interested in being a trainer at FDM, we are currently recruiting at our Frankfurt office. Find out more here: https://www.fdmgroup.com/de/de-other-job-vacancies – we would be happy to welcome you to the team!