Tim tells us about his journey before Sweet Mustard and how he finally found the working place he was looking for:

I always had a great interest in computers and software, but for personal reasons I ended up leaving secondary school at the age of 14 to start working as a construction worker. Since then I have done various jobs in construction and renovation. 12 years later I discovered the “Programming in .NET C#” course for unemployed people, for free. I did not hesitate and made an appointment and attended the first info session. I passed all tests and started my 8 month-course after a waiting period of 4 months. It felt great. For the first time in my life I was doing what I loved to do and wanted to do on a daily basis.

After receiving my certificate “Software Development in .NET C#”, I contacted an IT recruitment bureau, and after one phone call I received a vacancy in my mailbox. “Sweet Mustard is a very young, exponentially growing collaboration between TVH and Cronos Group, searching for .NET developers to start a new .NET team.” Again, I did not hesitate and very soon I had my first pleasant interview with Mike and Lander. I already felt it was a match. The way they presented the company, the goals and projects, how Sweet Mustard treats and motivates their employees intrigued me. After a second, again very pleasant interview, I received a phone call and they offered me a contract.

Working at Sweet Mustard has already been quite the adventure. I learned more the past month than I did the last year! I have an experienced collegue-.NET developer by my side and we are both setting up a .NET environment, and in the near future the first projects will roll in. The whole Sweat Mustard team is a very tight group with friendly and helpful people. I can evolve in what I do best, while catching up with technologies that I am not yet experienced in or familiar with.

I am very thankful for this opportunity. Motivation and ambition beats any degree, and Sweet Mustard is a great example of this.

The first day at a new job can be a bit awkward. Damien shares us his experience at Sweet Mustard:

First days can be difficult, you don’t know anyone, you don’t have the wifi codes and worst of all, you’re sure to mess up your first coffee because you don’t know how the machine works yet. The first day at Sweet Mustard on the other hand already gives you a good idea on how things are done here.

ou’re welcomed by the team over a good (sweet mustard) cup of coffee you don’t have to poor yourself 😃. After a brief introduction you’re guided to your own personal trello ‘Welcome board’ where you find all the useful information for your first weeks. It starts with the obvious accounts and supplies information up to the creation of your own avatar which is published the same day to our website. It certainly gives you a feeling to be part of the team right away.

We all have lunch together in the kitchen. One big table, one big team. Conversations kick off and you’re feeling at home with a new family. After lunch you find yourself catching up on the useful and interesting on the Slack channels and by the end of the day it’s like you have always been working here.

Conclusion of the first day: Friendly and helpful team, the environment feels right and the tools are working just great. You feel connected!

Wouter and Tim are the first .NET team members at Sweet Mustard. They are laying the foundations of the future .NET team and architecture. Here’s Wouter telling us about his first weeks in the middle of the JAVA jungle

Most of the back-end developers at Sweet Mustard swear by Java, which is seen an enemy of .NET (dotnet) in programming land. During my career as a programmer, I’ve been using a lot of different programming languages, so for me Java is just another language that shares the same concepts. In that sense, I have the feeling that we can learn a lot from each other.

Luckily I did not have to start this adventure on my own as Tim joined Sweet Mustard the same day. Together, we’re laying down the first rules and guidelines for the team that will be responsible for delivering .NET based solutions to our customers.

In this regard, Sweet Mustard is giving us the opportunity and autonomy to build a team and a new competence that might frighten our Java colleagues.

As the projects and customers are coming in fast at Sweet Mustard, it’s great to be able to start working on projects right away. Sanne tells us about his contribution during his first weeks

During my first days at Sweet Mustard I met a lot of friendly people who were all very willing to give me tips and show me the way of working. Sweet Mustard also has an amazing Trello board, which transforms the pain of on-boarding into a “piece of cake”.

After diving into some internal processes, I was already assigned a first project: a calculator to find the technically correct panel for your ventilation system. We started off with a kick-off meeting, and are now onto creating the first set of wireframes that will illustrate how a user can search and calculate panels.

Next to the project, I’m also doing research to create a knowledge sharing “system” (name to be decided yet). The idea is to create a system where a variety of information is gathered, from different expertises: design, development, management, coaching, sales, … This will help us work more efficient, and it will also show other agencies, clients, prospects, .. how we work and what we are capable of.

So, here we are, happy avatars in a happy Sweet Mustard world