From the life of parallelist

When I say that I work in the Parallels Moscow office in Sviblovo, the usual reaction is: “Is this the hell on the horns?”. In fact, it is only 21 minutes by metro from Tretyakovskaya. It is good that the initial cries about geography are compensated by the phrase: “Yes, but you are cool”. Under the cut a lot of pictures and a bit of text about our office life. I will try to pour less oil and pink kissel, but if that, do not judge too, after all corporate blog.

About office

Previously, we lived in the metro area "Otradnoe" (some called this place "dismal"). Well, as in the area, in fact, from the subway for 10-15 minutes by bus to Altufevskoe highway. We occupied two office floors there. Nice, cozy, but hot in summer. The infrastructure was ascetic. Without restaurants, shops, hot spots and other attributes of a successful life.
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Today, our office looks different. Here you will find cafes and restaurants, a hairdresser, supermarkets and even a children's store. By the way, pay attention to the colors of the building. It is quite a corporate style (red and white).



The Moscow office of Parallels is one of the ten world offices of the company. Here is the largest software development center. Two more R & D centers (eng. Research and Development) are located in Estonia and Malta. Everything is cool here, but the sea is very lacking. Look at the view from the windows of the Maltese colleagues (sorry for the offtopic).



On the reception of all meets our excellent security officer - Dima. Along with other talents, he has perfect English. Moreover, the level of knowledge is confirmed by various international tests. Every person has his own hobby.



Getting into the office you pay attention to the glass doors. They are installed almost everywhere (except for toilets and server). Previously, for the first time, guests at the Parallels Moscow office were surprised by the silence and the lack of people in the corridors. It seemed that the squares were empty. Now through the glass doors you can see that all the staff meditate safely in their places.



Pay attention to the walls. Here are photos of company employees and even some members of their families. By the way, the photos were taken by the employees themselves.



The office has lots of fun places. For example, one of the development teams installed the "Wall of Wailing", well, or you can say the exit section VDNH. In addition to books on virtualization, a soldering iron, LEDs and a pig with wings, rare books of Playboy magazine are kept on the shelves.



We also have a real tree of desires. Here you can stick a fig leaf with your Wishlist and gain blessings and office bounties.



In general, employees have an infinite number of opportunities to refine their personal space. Virtually all of this chance is used to the best of their abilities, capabilities and imagination.



Especially popular are various feathered animals.



Although in the corridors you can meet quite neutral motives. For which many thanks to our office fairy - Lena.



Parallels employees can reduce stress and comprehend nirvana in two ways that are popular in the company. The first is a massage chair.



The second is table tennis. Periodically, quite intriguing cries are heard from the recreation area. This means that once again someone from the staff of someone in the next game cynically “punishes”.

About life and culture

Officially, the working day starts at ten in the morning and lasts until seven in the evening. At the same time, employees independently determine the time limits. It is convenient for someone to come earlier, someone later. In this sense, Parallels has a fairly democratic rule: work at a convenient time, the main thing is the result.



The company also has no strict requirements for the form of clothing. Of course, everyone gets branded T-shirts, shirts, baseball caps and other souvenirs, but no one forces them to wear them. There are legends that last summer people in shorts and beach slippers were spotted in the office. Why not, the main thing is that not naked.



We have dining and coffee points on all floors of the office. Here, each employee can pour coffee, tea or jelly. Cookies, nuts, fresh vegetables and fruits. All that without which it is difficult to imagine the life of a modern IT company.



In Parallels it is customary to refer to "You." In many ways, this is due to the fact that people have been working together for many years. The core of the development team was formed more than fifteen years ago.



Working correspondence is conducted mainly in English. The appearance of this tradition was preceded by a funny story. One day, the development team had a long discussion by email. In the recipients were a few dozen people. Opinions expressed in Russian, some used idiomatic expressions. At some point, one of the participants in the conversation wrote “What is this x ****” (garbage - author's note), which puzzled the others. It turned out that during the week the American colleagues could not understand the meaning of some phrases. Having finally lost the thread of conversation, they had to try to express their thoughts in Russian. As a result, employees now try to correspond in English on work issues.



Another corporate tradition can be considered sessions of group gluttony. For example, sandwiches with red caviar after each new release. The head of the development team early in the morning personally spreads caviar on white bread toasts, symbolizing the process of spawning (emotional arousal) during the preparation of a new product or updates. Also in Parallels it is customary to collectively congratulate birthday people. Usually everyone gathers in the dining room, shakes hands with newborns, bestows lucky people, after which they massively eat pizza. Some even make memorable photos with her. And in the red calendar, we have a Programmer's Day, February 23, March 8, Bastille Day and New Year.



Also quite often in Parallels meetings are held in Tech Talk or All Hands format. They gather the whole team and discuss current issues. In general, the company decided to discuss on burning topics openly.

About slang

Parallels Corporate Dictionary is replete with a variety of neologisms. To cite the entire vocabulary is problematic for censorship reasons, but some of the “pearls” are below.

Anbazarabl - no problem. It originated from the combination of two expressions - “without a bazaar” and the English prefix un. Usually used in case you can do something pretty quickly, and without straining.

Curly interface - a beautiful, with great functionality.

Pipka - bulging part of the computer. Usually a USB character.

Fart - from PUCC (pick up and call customer).

Scriptizer is a technical support specialist who is responsible for writing scripts (answer lines for users' questions) of call service.

Hack is a temporary non-system solution. Sample application: "dirty hack." Translation: “I really don't like this hack. Soon, when refactoring takes place, this hack will become a system solution. ”

A crutch is a piece of code that serves as a patch for something that does not work. The main difference from a hack is that a hack is not a universal, temporary solution that works in a limited (but necessarily overwhelming) number of cases, while the crutch is designed to fix some properties of the universal code.

In the final, it would be possible to push something patriotic and pathetic, but instead, here is our collective photo.



For the photo thanks to our HR-manager Katya Firsova .