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My 9 Month Journey with Appian

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Hi everyone! I’m Pedro, a Portuguese Senior Consultant at Appian. I’m currently celebrating my 9-month journey with the company and wanted to share how it’s been going for those who may be interested in joining.

Since I started my professional career, I’ve always considered myself a “migrant” of some sort. After university, I left my home close to Porto in order to work as a consultant in Lisbon. Although I promised myself that my “migrant” status would not last more than a couple of years, here I am 7 years later living in London. Moving to the United Kingdom was a personal objective for a while and I was really happy to have the opportunity to accomplish this by starting a new adventure with Appian whose values I feel as mine.

First Day! — Northern Virginia HQ

Once all the dust from moving to a new country settled (special thanks to Appian’s Recruiting and HR team for making it such a smooth process), I was finally ready to start! I flew out to Washington D.C where I joined a large group of colleagues from all over the world.. We all belong to several departments within the company (Internal IT, Marketing, Engineering up until Customer Success) but we all experienced the same 3-day company orientation. During this orientation, we were able to understand Appian’s values and vision — with the help of one of Appian’s Founders Marc Wilson — while discovering how our own characteristics could be used appropriately in a team environment. After those 3 days, a group of us embarked on Appian’s Academy and Boot Camp for 2.5 weeks where we learned and perfected our understanding of how Appian works and how it can be used to deliver great outcomes for our customer base.

Appian’s Suite in Capital One and the Onboarding class

The truth is, 3 weeks is a long time away from home. However, the time I spent out of our Northern Virginia HQ allowed me to get to meet a bunch of colleagues from around the world. Not only that, but I was able to create even more memories outside of the office by attending some great events such as The Lumineers’ concert and an NBA game in Appian’s Suite in Capital One Arena Thanks, AppianLIFE workplace experience team!

After only a few months in, we were faced with an unprecedented challenge: COVID-19. Thankfully, I was still able to experience our London office for a couple of weeks, which helped me get to know more colleagues and get to grips with being in a new company and position. However, all of a sudden we were all working from home in a remote setting. I could tell right away that Appian was used to working with people remotely which made the transition a lot easier. Nonetheless, it was a big challenge for me since I’m quite a fan of the whole office dynamics (seeing and meeting new colleagues and collaborating on the open floor).

As this challenge emerged, it became more evident that I was joining a company destined to make a great contribution during this complicated period. I was assigned to a project for the Bexley Health Neighbourhood Care GP Federation in order to create an application that would allow this healthcare provider to comply with the UK’s National Health Service COVID-19 Hospital Discharge Service Requirements. Surrounded by brilliant colleagues, we all pushed quite hard to deliver a great solution as quickly as possible. While I must admit that I had never worked so hard in my career, I walked away with an overwhelming feeling of purpose. Contributing with something tangible to help during this pandemic will always be one of the highlights of my career and life.

During these complicated times, Appian has shown me how important it is to work for a company with such an incredible support system. Making sure that everyone was safe and reminding employees of resources they can utilize during these times is something that Appian has been quite keen on for the last months.

Since that amazing project wrapped up, I’ve been able to experience what it means to work in Customer Success at Appian. Putting the customer’s success as a top priority while delivering enterprise ready, scalable solutions that have a true impact on the day-to-day life of a company and its collaborators is not an easy job but it’s definitely one that makes you feel fulfilled. Later on, I promptly got involved in projects in different industries and regions: from Financial Services in the UK to Telco in Spain — what an opportunity to improve my Spanish. :) I’m really looking forward to my next adventures as an Appian consultant.

P.S. We are hiring! There are openings within Customer Success around the world, so I encourage you to check our openings if you’re looking for a new challenge in your life! You can also find me on LinkedIn if you ever want to connect and talk about openings within my department.