Industry experience is important in understanding the various career opportunities for the students and also in bridging the gap between academia and industry. Having best of both worlds, helps in presenting a clearer and detailed picture about the career objectives, ethics and norms to the students and advise them accordingly.
Experiences:
I had an internship opportunity at Variable Electron Cyclotron Center (VECC), Kolkata as a summer undergraduate internship. It helped me understand the career goals and objectives as a research scientist in a research lab.
I have also had two years of industry experience at CSC. My job responsibilities include development and testing. It helped me understand various industry ethics, norms and also time management.
As a postdoctoral researcher, my research project is in collaboration with industry partner. The experience taught me about maintaining a balanced working relation with industry, getting application perspective of the research and various funding opportunities.
Applications:
During my industrial experiences, I used the knowledge and experiences in action for the development of the real world applications. Also, I gained the business perspective of the applications we developed. This in turn, helped me incorporating or sharing my experience with the students while teaching.
I have worked in a team in these experiences. This helped me understand the software development life cycle in action and also how to share the work and track them with the team members.
Industry Experience in Teaching:
The industry experiences made me understand the underlying business implications of the software development. I have incorporated and shared by experiences while building the course materials as an instructor. For example, incorporating peer programming and test driven development in the lab sessions. Also, the exercise problems in the lab sessions mirror business problems such as building inventory, etc.