Our graduates

Maksat Kadyrov, 28, started working in Silicon Valley - at LinkedIn - in March 2020. He started living in the USA back in 2016: he studied and worked in Southern California near Los Angeles. 

 

Maksat Kadyrov was born in Aktobe, and has lived in Nur Sultan since 2011. He graduated with a bachelor's degree in Automation and Management from L. N. Gumilev Eurasian National University. Later, he enrolled in the master's degree program at the California University of Management and Sciences in California (USA), specializing in computer information systems

       

 

My position on Linkedin is Senior Software Engineer. In this position, compensation (salary) is approximately 300,000 dollars (more than 130 million tenge) per year. It includes promotions and bonuses. It is important to note that approximately 35 percent of the salary goes to various tax payments, and shares are generally subject to 56 percent of taxation. In addition, I run an Instagram blog where I talk about the everyday life of a programmer, how to "apply" for interviews and how to pass them, what to teach, read, how to answer questions, talk about various technologies that are used in large companies, and about my IT company and projects.

In 2016, when I was moonlighting as a food deliveryman, I got a delivery several times to Blizzard, the company developing the World of Warcraft game. Then I was just shocked by their office, I dreamed of working for them. I searched for employees of this company on LinkedIn and wrote to them asking them to hand over my resume. They still haven't answered me. But I didn't purposefully try to get a job in a big company. It just happened that way.

 

There are a lot of Kazakhstanis in the Valley, many work at Google and Facebook. I personally know three Kazakhstanis on LinkedIn. I think every major company has them. In our company, there is a group of Russian-speaking people in Slack (corporate messenger), all of them from the post-Soviet space. We meet for lunch and have gatherings. Now, of course, this happens extremely rarely and only in the fresh air.

 

I think it's normal that people go to work abroad, but I really hope that they will return with experience and ideas. If we don't need the country ourselves, then no one needs it. My wife and I are planning to return.

 

Now I want to gain experience and grow. Even if I am offered a huge salary in Kazakhstan and a position, I will not return yet. I think another 5-7 years in Silicon Valley and I will be really of great benefit to the country.