An unforgettable student exchange inspired Hitesh Monga to apply for technology studies and work in Finland
GE HealthCare is a leading health technology innovator that strongly encourages young talent at its Finnish unit, which will employ ninety interns this year. The company treats summer employees as full members of the workplace community, and many return after graduation.
GE HealthCare Finland has quite an international workplace community, as it consists of employees from 30 different countries. The company’s interns have a similar – or even slightly broader – ethnic diversity. English is the working language for most positions, which enables international experts studying in Finland to work at the company.
One of them is 24-year-old Hitesh Monga, who fell in love with Finland during his student exchange programme in Helsinki. Monga, who was born and raised in India, returned to Europe after completing his bachelor’s degree and is now studying telecommunications engineering at Aalto University. This soon-to-be Master of Science is enjoying his studies and has noticed some differences between higher education in India and Finland.
“The technology studies that I’ve done at a Finnish university have been considerably more practical in nature than those I did during my bachelor’s degree in India. I like this concreteness, as it prepares you for the dynamic challenges you’ll face in working life,” says Monga.
Internships Enhance Your Career
This summer, Monga is doing a software engineering internship in GE HealthCare’s Parameters & Wearables unit, which focuses on patient monitoring. During his five-month summer internship, he will get to develop embedded software for patient monitors, carry out internal testing, and familiarise himself with the entire software development cycle. He will also participate in the design of several device features. Monga, who is currently halfway through his internship, says that his technical skills have already developed tremendously and the internship has confirmed his feeling of being ‘on the right track’.
International Students Contribute Unique Expertise
A number of teams in the company handle onboarding and help interns to adapt to their new working environment. Interns are given an appropriate amount of responsibility and are treated as full members of their team regardless of their age or experience. Joint onboarding sessions help interns to get to know both each other and the company’s practices.
“Interns bring new energy and fresh insights into modern working life. Not only do they carry out their tasks excellently, they also help us to develop our ways of working,” says GE HealthCare Finland’s HR Manager, Mirva Mäki-Petäjä.
Interns are treated as full members of their team regardless of their age or experience.
GE HealthCare is committed to nurturing an inclusive culture in which everyone has the chance to do their job well, as they feel that they belong and are accepted. The company’s entire business is therefore based on respect, transparency and integrity.
“Our interns get to do real jobs that challenge both them and what they’ve learned. They have the chance to be involved in the development of health technology and the manufacture of real healthcare products,” says Mäki-Petäjä.
Meaningful Work with World-Class Technology
Monga says that a sense of doing meaningful work has steered his choice of both degree and job. Promoting healthcare productivity and digitisation will directly improve outcomes for patients, healthcare providers, healthcare systems and researchers around the world.
“I like to feel that my work is important. Not every working day can be an incredibly exciting experience, but a sense of meaningfulness helps you cope at work and enjoy what you do,” says Monga.
His job satisfaction is also strongly linked to GE HealthCare’s diverse workplace community, in which Monga received a warm welcome. When he started his internship, he was astonished by the diversity of his tasks and the prevailing workplace culture.
“I imagined that my job would largely consist of the tasks listed in the job advertisement. Yet in reality, I’ve been able to do much more and develop my skills. I was also surprised by the extent to which colleagues do things together, even in their free time. We often play ping pong and basketball together, and go for coffee after work. This creates a huge sense of community, and has helped me get to know my colleagues on a more personal level,” says Monga.
Monga is now nearing the end of his studies, and is keen to continue living in Finland and working with health technology. He considers his colleagues to be strong role models from whom he is continually able to learn. Working in a meaningful environment has inspired him to develop as a technology professional.
Text: Jenna Laine
Photos: GE HealthCare