When opportunity knocks, dare to open the door
Experienced people know that careers are founded on as much luck as judgement and skill, as Arnela Masic discovered during her engineering studies in 2015. One lucky moment put her on a path to the career she enjoys today: she forgot her lunch. “A friend suggested I could get a free lunch at an ASML-hosted lunch meeting on campus that day. It was there I learned about the ASML scholarship. I applied and was eventually selected – it felt pretty special as only 25 scholarships are on offer in the Netherlands each year.” Through the scholarship, ASML supported Arnela through a Masters in Systems and Control, which then led to her joining the company in 2017.
Nothing “grey-haired” about it
“Everybody at my university had heard of ASML – the logo is everywhere. But what they did there was more of a mystery. For me personally, ‘lithography’ did not sound as interesting as other technical industries like aerospace or automotive. I was picturing grey-haired guys doing boring experiments. It wasn’t until I got to know them through the scholarship that I realized there’s nothing ‘grey-haired’ about it. There are so many different careers here, with such diverse, super-smart people. It was nothing like I expected.”
Engineering and so much more
“I was looking for more than just a ‘technical’ job. After learning about the many different careers on offer, the role of Customer Support Applications Engineer really appealed to me. I get to travel to customer sites around the world – the US, Korea, Japan, China and Taiwan - and work on projects to improve the performance of our lithography systems. I get to use my engineering knowledge – not in terms of always knowing the answers, but in terms of applying logic, troubleshooting, analysis and identifying which experts can help – and I combine it with communications, project management and implementation. There’s great team spirit; I’m supported by a wide network of experienced colleagues who all help each other.”
Are you interested to learn more about ASML? Visit www.asml.com/students for more information about our events, internships and scholarship program.
An idea worth millions
“And I receive lots of training, both technical and non-technical – soft skills like customer focus and influencing without power.” Arnela quickly found out how useful her newly acquired skills are. “There was project at a customer where it was important to prove a certain output of a machine in order to make the sale. However, at that moment, there was an issue with one of the machine parts that would not have helped my demo test. My training helped me convince people to make this issue a priority over their own projects, resulting not only in a permanent solution, but also in the sale of the system worth millions!”
Arnela’s advice – ‘go for it’
“My advice is if something about a job sounds interesting then don’t overthink it, just try it, because you never know exactly what you will be doing on a day to day basis. That’s ok, nobody does when they start. But at companies like ASML, you will have excellent training, support and inspiring colleagues, so there’s no need to be afraid to go for it. When opportunity knocks, dare to open the door. For me, there’s has literally been a whole world to discover, and I’m really enjoying the journey – it was worth stepping into the unknown to start it.”
