Unbelievably, yesterday was the 10 year anniversary of when I joined ThoughtWorks.

It blows my mind that a whole decade has passed since the first day I walked into our London office with Becky and Val, as a recent graduate, as we hid in the kitchen, too nervous to join our new colleagues on the desks.

When I think about it, 23 to 33 is such a formative time in your life. I’ve grown up here. This will sound cheesy but ThoughtWorks has not only taught me how to be a software engineer, a coach, a leader but I think it’s almost definitely taught be how to be a better person. I may not be the biggest social and economic justice activist that I‘m sure our founder Roy would love us all to be. But I proudly call myself a feminist, I understand my privilege, I value diversity, equality and equity for all, and I’m pretty sure that a lot of those socialist liberal values have rubbed off on me too.

My journey with ThoughtWorks has been pretty up and down (especially at the beginning!), and my path has been wonderfully winding. But turns out moving to Canada 6 weeks in gave me life long friends, a pretty awesome husband, chances to work with and become friends with two of my current colleagues (I can’t beleive that Mike and Rebecca you’ve seen me grow up here). Chicago gave me more awesome people and experiences, and coming back to London the same.

A wise ex-colleague of mine Warren said as he was leaving that “as long as you are getting opportunities to grow and learn and do interesting work, stay and enjoy this amazing place”. He was right, and I still am.

I’ve had so many great opportunities and experiences through my time at ThoughtWorks, worked in and travelled to many far flung countries, gotten to speak at conferences and met, learnt from and become friends with amazing people from all kinds of backgrounds. I hope that I’ve left a positive impact on those who I’ve crossed paths with too.

The first time I met ThoughtWorks, I travelled up to London from Devon to attend a graduate open day, when my step dad picked me up from the train on the way home, he asked me what it had been like and my response was “well…. they are all totally crazy, but they are so passionate about what they do, I think I’ll fit in perfectly”. Still so true today, and I’m pretty happy to count myself amount them.

So many memories, so many laughs and quite a lot of gin later I often think that ThoughtWorks years are like dog years, 1 year here is like 3 somewhere else, and I’m feeling all those years. So…. here’s to us ThoughtWorks and all the wondberfullly crazy people I’ve met along the way, may we look forward to a few more.