​Yevgen, Collaboration Service Line Lead, Canada
Joined Avanade 2002

Life at Avanade?
I think it’s a great place to work and if I wasn't comfortable telling that to my friends and my acquaintances I really wouldn't have spent as much time here as I have.

Training, growth, opportunities, projects and people are the five factors that I would describe as our differentiators.

What is unique about working at Avanade?
If you look at local boutique consulting companies and the large system integrators, Avanade is certainly exhibiting higher growth rates than the rest of the industry. Couple those aspects with the unique culture at Avanade and you'll find a big growth opportunity for everybody involved.

I talk to a lot of potential recruits. While Avanade is not the widest-known brand like IBM, Accenture or some of the other players, as soon as you start talking through the story people's eyes light up. To me that is the biggest validation that we are on the right path.

Recognition at Avanade
The ultimate recognition is getting an opportunity to take on a stretching role or grow your skills. In addition to getting some of those growth opportunities to try on for size, there's also a wide arena of programmes such as delivery awards, sales awards, as well as some of the region-specific programmes—what we call spot awards in Canada.

That really enables us to recognize the people that go above and beyond the call of duty.

My favourite project
I've had the pleasure of taking on additional responsibilities and being able to grow my role. Of the last few projects that I've done, something that I would call my favourite, probably my most challenging one involved putting together a collaboration strategy for an asset management firm and really following through and implementing it end to end.

And that to me is where Avanade is able to bring the best of its assets, people thinking, expertise to the table and really drive home the value for the customer.

Does Avanade look after you?
We are very committed as an organization to training everybody, and to ensure that our people acquire the skills that are required to enable their professional growth. That's what is different in Avanade—it's not just about technology skills. We are a consulting organization and it takes a wide array of skills to be successful.

So if you look at our training curriculum, there's a number of courses that are specific to technology but you can also find training in consulting skills, in project management skills, sales skills, project delivery skills and, last but not least, negotiation skills. And that to me is how we've been able to enable our people to grow.