I am an Engineer with an MBA from NITIE. I have around 12 years of experience in Supply Chain post-MBA and a couple of pre-MBA as an engineer with a telecom company. All my roles, including the current ones, have had nothing to do with Data sciences or Artificial Intelligence, or Machine Learning. In fact, it does not involve working with any form of programming language.
Before and even after the program, I continue to remain a Supply Chain professional. But one with a difference from most others. I believe technology like AIML or blockchain will disrupt the way we do business or even our jobs. I believe that the only way to not just survive but thrive in the on-coming change is to be an (early) adopter of this change. The AIML course with GreatLearning was my big step in that direction.
My work takes up much more than 8 hours a day. My professional challenges aside, I believed I was not doing enough to develop myself personally outside work. I have taken online courses before Great Learning, but none with such a large duration of active engagement and involving this high degree of rigor. Neither did any of these courses require me to make a financial commitment at this scale. I feared that I could easily sink my investment if I could not keep up with the curriculum or lost interest. In fact, there were so many reasons this decision/plan could have gone sideways.
A course in AIML was on top of my To-Do list. I started by trying my hand on a free course on one of the open online course providers, but it wasn’t quite working out for me. I also tried doing some reading online by myself, but it was hard going as the learning process wasn’t structured enough. That’s when I came across an advertisement from Great Learning about their course in AIML. So, I did my research, compared similar courses offered by others, and read the course reviews by past students. What sealed the deal for me was a Great Learning alumnus in my network that I reached out to, who spoke highly about the course. It also helped put to rest some of the concerns I had about my ability to finish the course. The alumnus spoke highly about the Program Managers at Great Learning who support you through the course to ensure that you make it through. And also about how the program was structured along with the live mentoring sessions so that every student had enough support throughout their learning experience.
Mentored learning through live weekly interaction with a subject matter expert is a great way to plug understanding gaps and finish up those rough edges. But for it to work as effectively as intended, the learners needed to complete their course material for the week before the mentoring session. What benefited me the most was when the mentors spoke about how some of what we were learning was applied at work by them. The challenges they faced and how they worked around it. Or about some of the other works happening in the said area, and where could we read more about it. Given the pace at which the AIML space is evolving, the mentoring sessions, other than covering the weekly content and doubt solving, also provided a view of what else was happening in this space. Mentors were also a great support during the capstone project.
My learning objective from the course was to get a thorough understanding of the AIML field. The other objective was to connect with academia, practitioners, and the community in this field. I have accomplished fairly well both these objectives.
Mark Twain said, “The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex, overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks, and then starting on the first one”. A part of the ‘getting started’ part is you as a learner. The other part of breaking down is well covered by GL in the way the course is structured. Make sure you stick to the course timelines and be inquisitive. It will be a very fulfilling and fruitful journey.
