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April 2017
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As a standard-bearer for PrivateFly’s technology, Vidya Puthur’s role is a challenging one – sometimes she has to reject new development, at other times negotiate timescales

A bus, a sprint and a lunchtime briefing

Mornings begin at six o'clock for Vidya Puthur, test analyst in UK-headquartered PrivateFly's technology team. She wakes her six-year-old son, prepares a speedy breakfast and drops him at school in Finchley, north London, on her way to work in St Albans, an hour away.

For an online booking platform, the tech team is a critical area of the business. Behind the customer website much of the development effort goes into continually upgrading the quoting and booking process for aircraft operators, including integrations with industry software. Vidya's role is to interpret requirements from the business, log them and test the resulting software changes, before approving them for the live environment.

Her working day starts on the bus when she responds to any overnight issues. With some of the company's tech team based in India, they're already halfway through their day. If an urgent fix is required she can get the ball rolling on her way in.

The tech team works in agile development cycles known as 'sprints', typically over two weeks. Mid-morning she joins their daily stand up, a ten-minute meeting to cover the previous day's accomplishments, set the day's goals and discuss any potential problems.

With the Indian team only available for a few more hours, Vidya's morning is focussed on interacting with them. Today they're working out some integration issues with a scheduling software provider. It seems some operators are using an older version of the software and need to upgrade.

Cross-functional lunchtime briefings are a regular event at PrivateFly and today she eats while listening to CEO Adam Twidell talk about a recent trip to Germany to meet operators, FBOs and clients.

After lunch it's a full afternoon of testing. Today she's reviewing changes to PrivateFly's sales dashboard and new finance reporting. She uses three screens, switching between the specifi-cation, the UAT environment (a copy of the live website), and her reporting. She performs a systematic routine of checks, including regression testing, to make sure there are no negative knock-on effects on other functions. Her focus is to ensure quality and check that user requirements have not become lost. Today she approves the work for live release while highlighting some minor issues for a future fix.

The day ends with emails to the team in India to set them up for the next morning, and then she can head for home.