Augusto Coppola

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Being an IT Engineer in Rome
Augusto Coppola
co-founder CEO ERIS4
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1. Presentation goal
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To acquire knowledge, one must study but to
acquire wisdom, one must observe (M. Vos Savant)
Its hard to make predictions, especially about
the future (Yogi Berra)
I took a course in speed reading and was able to
read War and Peace in 20 minutes. It's about
Russia (W. Allen)
Get your facts first. You can distort them
later (M. Twain)
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2. Profession foundations
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Engineers operate at the interface between
science and society (G. Brown)
I understand a fury in your words, but not the
words (W. Shakespeare)
We have really everything in common with America
nowadays except, of course, language (O. Wilde)
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3. Market evolution and change
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• Trends in IT
• Applications abstracting software complexity
• Industry boundaries are falling down
• Geographic know how
• New markets are emerging
• Open source

If automobiles were like computers, a Rolls-Royce
would today cost 100, gets one million miles to
the gallon, and explode once a year, killing
everyone inside (R. Cringley)
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4. The Italian market landscape
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• Low competition
• Risk adverse
• No innovation
• Business network crucial role
• Increasing importance of finance engineering

• Companies
• Incumbents
• Fat guys
• Italian integrators
• International newcomers
• Man power providers
• Risk-takers

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5. Three gaps
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• Technical gap
• Business Analyst
• Operational/Standard Analyst
• Sales Skills
• Marketing
• Strategic Planning
• Quality Engineer
• Technical Writer
• ...
• Developer

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Computer Science introductory programming
digital system principles computer architecture
logic design data structures and algorithms
machine-level programming programming language
concepts optimization methods graph models
search and pruning techniques
Software Engineering software architecture and
design requirements specification professional
communication skills designing concurrent and
real-time software designing parallel and
distributed systems computation methods user
interface design software process and product
metrics principles of information system design
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• Examples of Real Technical Questions Asked
• Whats a requirement? Whats an architecture?
• Whats a class? Whats an object?
• Whats a process? Whats a thread?
• Whats a transaction?
• Whats a pattern?
• Whats the difference between Java and C?
• Whats a unit/integration/system test?
• Whats a socket? Whats a service?
• Two processes synch problem
• Whats RADIUS? Whats SIP?
• Explain plainly your thesis

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• Market/Industry Knowledge gap
• Professional profiles
• Career dynamics
• Players reputation
• Segment dynamics

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• Mentality gap
• Fall in love with names
• No self-confidence
• No dreams, no entrepreneurship

No matter what the name of your company is, most
of the best talents in the world do not work for
you (B. Joy)
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• Be a dreamer
• Think different
• Find a few soul mates
• Draft your business concept
• Set Milestones, Assumptions and Tasks
• Ignore the irrelevant
• Search for a Venture Capital who trusts you
• Execute the plan
• Be successful
• Pay back society

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• They did it already!
• Google, Amazon, Pixar, YouTube
• Skype,
• Smarten, Venere, Ducati

• ... And they did it not!
• Olivetti first personal computer
• Cselt introduced MP3 technology
• A friend of mine we discussed the Amazon
  concept in 1993

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6. Five simple actions
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I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do
and I understand. (Chinese Proverb)
Read books Practice your English Start an open
project or participate an existing one Think
honestly about your aptitudes Be a dreamer and
draft your business plan
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7. Conclusions
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In just two days, tomorrow will be yesterday
We live in a world of surprises. Be prepared!
Think education is expensive? Try ignorance
The specialist knows more and more about less and
less and finally knows everything about
nothing (K. Lorenz)
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8. Advertising
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No one knows for sure what the future will bring.
If you would risk, create and lead, we would like
to meet you. Come join us as we continue to
change the way technology companies do
business. You might think you have to live on
the Silicon Valley to be able to participate in a
company on the leading edge of high technology,
especially if you are hoping for the kind of
professional growth shown by the hottest
start-ups. That is not the case. ERIS4 has its
corporate headquarters in the centre of Rome,
Italy, and we strongly believe that no one else
can offer the same exciting environment we can
offer. Company culture is based on strong
professional know how, ethical behaviors,
personal accountability and freedom to
perform. Our Engineering Team has a deep
understanding of the software design and best
practices ability to design and develop complex
systems as well as to fluently speak Italian and
English are a must. ERIS4 offers some of the
best salary packages in the industry. ERIS4 is an
equal opportunity employer
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Are you smart enough? Drop us a
mail! jobs_at_eris4.com subject code 07PM
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Any Question?