Accelerating AI Project Experience and Securing a Consultant Job at IBM

Vasyl Buchmei completed four Omdena AI Challenges within six months and secured a consulting job offer at IBM afterward.

Vasyl, what is your background?

I got my double master’s degree from Ivano-Frankivsk National Technical University of Oil and Gas (Ukraine) in Geodesy and Land Management, and from AGH University of Science and Technology (Poland) in Geodesy, Cartography and Land Management. Two years later in 2021, I started to learn more deeply about data science and machine learning through the e-learning ZTM platform, upon which I joined Omdena to acquire real-world experience.

Vasyl, what job did you get?

I joined IBM as a junior data fabric consultant in 2022. I currently work with IBM software and a methodology called data fabric – an architectural approach to simplify data access in a client’s organization.

How did the Omdena experience help your career and personal life?

“The Omdena experience assured my view on the meaning that success is the sum of small efforts. At Omdena, every small contribution to the project makes an impact.”

Thanks to Omdena, I discovered what real-life data science projects look like and gained more experience in the AI area.

Some of the projects Vasyl took part in:

• ACET for Africa – Predicting Infrastructure Needs of Africa to Create Opportunities
• IRAP – Preventing Road Crashes and Saving Lives
• International Social Service (ISS) – Improving Cross-Border Child Protection
• WRI Climate Change – Leveraging Machine Learning to Minimize Climate Change Impacts
• AI for Peace PWG– Coronavirus: Using AI to Understand Policy Effects on the Economically Marginalized during Pandemics

What was the biggest obstacle you overcame?

One of the main obstacles I faced was overcoming my fear of taking the first step and joining the Omdena project in a new area for me. Getting started was difficult because my experience was mainly focused on engineering.