Choosing the right company and having the right opportunities early in your career can make all the difference to your learning curve. Here’s a peep into the growth opportunities at Clustr from the lens of career development.

Imagine you are a student fresh out of college, all bright-eyed and geared up to make your mark in the professional world. You want to be part of an organization where you can learn, grow, contribute and still feel at home. And if you’re lucky to land that dream job right out of college or early on in your professional career, you’re sorted.

I found my niche here at Clustr. And it’s been a great journey ever since.

I joined the company as a Data Scientist, one of the most globally sought-after, lucrative professions of the present day. For a young techie from IIT Roorkee looking to drive business growth with data-driven decision making, this was the dream in itself. But more than anything, I was drawn to the fact that not only would I get to channel my techie, geeky, curious spirit into the intriguing world of data sciences, I would be solving real-time, challenging problems for the masses that drive the Indian economy at its core – the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises or the MSMEs. That’s when I knew this was the place for me.

How we make a difference for our customers

When I say MSME, imagine your local grocery store owner who has always made a living in the same neighborhood, maybe for generations. Who probably has never heard of big data, let alone think that his/her business could benefit from it. Such small businesses are probably satisfied with making a certain level of financial returns and have only their own historical instances to draw inferences from. But what if they could get just the insights tailored for their own business? Or nuggets of information from the industry they operate in? And all these insights in a timely and more importantly, affordable manner? That would do wonders for their business, and their growth could in turn drive the country’s economic growth manifold.

Research shows that a whopping 99% of the Indian market is comprised of the MSME. So, when the problems of this sector is solved or minimized, it is possible to enrich the country’s economy.

At Clustr, we are building robust frameworks to empower the MSME by solving their problems at the ground level. We have various functions within Clustr that delve into the engineering, design & architecture aspects of the technology while we understand the data operations and apply analytics to enable business decision making. We have the right mindset, talent base and infrastructure to make a difference to the MSME market in developing economies such as ours. Moreover, with Tally’s reach into the Indian MSME market comprising of more than 2 Million customers, and our ecosystem, we are at the cusp of real change.

Growth opportunities at Clustr

As a data scientist, I got every opportunity to explore my boundaries and had the freedom to experiment algorithms, make mistakes and learn from them. For instance, one of the problems that intrigued me early on, was to optimally fetch query-specific web content and to process it for Natural Language Understanding. Along the way, I realized that data problems are intricately layered with market problems that needed more in-depth perspective around product management and ground market research.

I believe, as our professional career matures over time, we begin asking more questions about its impact on our work predilections. Clustr’s ecosystem fosters a culture of a curiosity, agility, and creative thinking towards problem solving. It allows employees to explore their boundaries and find the best professional version of themselves. Making mistakes is not frowned upon and learning from them is greatly encouraged. The value system not only nurtures a conducive work environment but offers employees vast opportunities for individual growth as well.

For example, over time, I realized that I would like to explore the product management ambit as well and augment my skills as a data scientist. For someone who is a techie at heart and heavily data focused to move laterally into a more people interaction-based and innovation-oriented role such as Product Management, it might have been difficult in a different scenario. But I found that in Clustr it was a smooth transition, solely because I had the necessary visibility from the management, guidance from the leadership and support from my peers within the company. They not only recognized my inherent personality and aptitude as one of people engagement but appreciated my need for understanding the market dynamics from the grassroots level on a hands-on basis.

Soon, I found that my experience as a data scientist actually proved invaluable in my role within product management. It gives me the right analytical layer and an objective lens to appreciate the technical aspects of the problem space. This means that I’m able to get a 360-degree view of the problem landscape and apply my technical knowledge as a data analytics professional. This allows us to crunch data while keeping an eye on the ground reality.

This kind of lateral, cross-functional transition is possible in a growing, learning-oriented company such as Clustr, which operates in a complex problem landscape and therefore appreciates the interdisciplinary nature of our work. The company believes in positively supporting employees’ career aspirations, aligning with their goals and allowing them to find their niche. This not only ensures that employees are intrinsically happy and productive individuals, but more importantly, they continue to be enthused and self-motivated in the long run. It inspires them to wake up and roll into work wholeheartedly.

There is an open, transparent and hierarchy-less work culture that encourages us to interact freely with the leaders, learn from our peers, question the status quo, define our role and chart our learning curves ourselves.

So, for a lifelong learner like me, it’s like living my dream.

If you’re looking to make your career in the areas of technology, engineering, architecture and data sciences, and still make a difference to the Indian economy, feel free to check out our current job openings or connect with us at careers@clustr.co.in.