They expected to be involved in meetings, but the four area high school students did not expect to see FGM, Inc.’s employees enjoy their workday. The Reston-based technology company hosted four students for a day on Friday, providing them an opportunity to shadow its workers.
“It’s not like the movie 'Office Space,' people want to come to work here,” said W.T. Woodson High School junior Seinjit Gadamsetty. He said that following FGM employees for a day eliminated a previous belief that corporate jobs are dead-end jobs.
Herndon High School sophomore Jonathan Trowbridge said he learned on Friday what it takes to be a successful candidate for a company such as FGM. For example, he said, he learned what kind of computer programming languages he needed to learn in order to gain employment with a technology company.
“I didn’t realize how efficient a company of 190 employees can be,” said Ted Markson, a junior at Herndon High. He said he was surprised to learn that FGM worked on a large variety of projects.
Gadamsetty said he was surprised to see that the same person could work on three to four different projects at once.
“We’re efficient,” said Emanuela Wenszel, a recruiter with the Reston-based company. Wenszel said that a lot of the company’s workforce is recruited from the local area, because it provides a great variety of well educated and technologically savvy young people.
While Friday’s events did not serve a recruitment purpose, FGM introduced Gadamsetty, Trowbridge, Markson and Adam Farrell — a senior at Falls Church High School — to one of Northern Virginia’s many technology companies. Chas Sumser, an FGM employee, said the company believes in being a part of the community, and Friday’s activities with the students reflected that belief. He said the activities were designed for the students to learn about more than computer science, which is what FGM’s specialty is. “It was for students to learn about working life and business.”
Aside from shadowing FGM employees for a few hours, the students also met with other employees and managers for a lunch on Friday afternoon.