ScholarX: Dinuka/ Dinuka Mentoring
What it’s Like to Be Mentored by the Best in the World!
Meet the Dinuka-s
Dinuka S. Wijesinghe can also be known as Dr. Dinuka, with a Ph.D. in Astrophysics from the University of Sydney, Australia. At the time I started writing this article, I had wanted to know what the ‘S’ in his name stood for, but that seemed like one of those things that I would’ve had to add to the never-ending list of things I hope to ask him the next time we meet. Hopefully, in person.
I refer to him as “Google Dinuka”/ “Dinuka Wije” in this blog as I do the same among my friends since he was very clear that he wasn’t a fan of being called ‘Doctor’ or ‘Sir’.
“You don’t need to respect me just because I have a qualification/ a title. I need to earn your respect. Hopefully, by the end of our mentoring sessions, I’ll be able to earn your respect.”
He said something along these lines to me in my very first mentoring session, when I asked him how he wanted to be addressed. As a person who likes to follow this way of earning and giving respect to everyone I meet (even though some people demand respect and I address them as they prefer, just for the sake of staying out of trouble 🙄), this really helped me admire & respect his views, opinions and ideas even more and made me confident that he would be a really good fit for me as a mentor.
Then we have me, Dinuka Ravijaya Piyadigama or just ‘Dinuka’. I always used to get called Dr. back in school because of my initials. I believe this reason and the fact that there are so many people with this title in my family & among family friends didn’t really help me appreciate chasing after titles or just respecting people based on their social statuses or qualifications.
Try guessing who has been getting the least amount of sleep here 👆🏽😂
Choosing a Mentor
Well, let me address the obvious. His name is Dinuka (same first name as mine). He works at Google. He has a PhD from Uni Sydney (This was the first uni I was interested in enrolling in Australia until I came to the understanding that Uni Melb had a better-suited course for my requirements). He was also at the very top of the list of available mentors (I believe this list was sorted Alphabetically)
Mainly because of the first 2 reasons, I made sure that I scanned through the entire list of mentors and tried searching for any other person who could outweigh the profile and interests of Google Dinuka. I didn’t want to have a mentor just because they worked at a major tech giant like Google. Of course, that’s a big plus point and helps the mentor’s profile look impressive and stand out. But that wasn’t my goal. I wanted to find someone I felt like would be able to relate to my way of thinking. I’m sure I spent at least 3 to 4 hours trying to find the best person that I thought would be most resourceful to me.
Meeting Google Dinuka
By the time I got in touch with Dinuka Wije, I had already completed my Undergraduate Final Year Project (FYP), Thesis, Viva and Degree. I knew that I had already done pretty well.
Although I’m aware of how impactful ScholarX mentors have been for final-year students especially with their final-year research projects, in my case, I would say most of the achievements that I was able to achieve in my final year of uni were primarily because of all the efforts that I put in the last 2–3 years. That being said, being a ScholarX volunteer did open up a lot of contact points that I could reach out to get my FYP evaluated. For most undergrads at this stage, this would have been an opportunity to find potential supervisors or mentoring related to support for a pursuit of a PhD. But, that wasn’t what I wanted and I’m glad that the mentor I decided to go with respected my views and helped me shape my path forward in the direction that would be the best for me.
Mentoring Process
On the first day, I met with Dinuka Wije, I decided that the following 2 points were what I wanted to get out of my mentoring sessions with him.
- How to shape my life moving forward — academics, career, etc.
- Managerial skills — his experiences, what he has done to upskill, and what I need to know to thrive as a manager.
A Summary of Insights Acquired from All Mentoring Sessions
- Framed my long-term & immediate goals & vision centred around professional, educational, and financial, qualifications, additional skills I would like to develop, where I want to live, and health & spiritual aspects of life. He wanted me to identify why I wanted to do, what I wanted to do.
- Learnt important skills that Google Dinuka believes helped him get to where he is in his life.
- Problem-solving skills
- Networking skills
- PhD in Astrophysics — used as an interesting conversation starter - Once, I vaguely mentioned my interest in learning how to invest in my future plan. Unlike the majority of the people in my life who don’t have a very positive outlook towards investing (reason to vaguely mention this), he was very much into investing and therefore had a lot of guidance and experience that he could share with me on investing and personal wealth management. We had quite a few lengthy sessions on financial planning & wealth management.
He broke down how he spends his entire salary, giving me an idea of what I could potentially be doing with the money that I hope to make by the time I turn 30–35.
Here are some additional resources he suggested for me to explore.
- The Intelligent Investor by Benjamin Graham
- The Richest Man in Babylon by George Samuel Clason
Employing a wealth manager can offer significant advantages when you’re earning substantial amounts of money.
“Understand why you want money. Know your intentions as to why you earn, spend & save. The usual saying is to save 30% & spend 70%. It’s better to save 70% and live off 30%”
- The level of income that’s possible to be generated in Australia, the US (particularly in the Bay Area) and the reasoning behind some of the higher paying jobs in FAANG companies.
- Insights into the Engineering Hierarchy at Google.
- Understood how Research Degrees work in Australia.
- Usually, Australian universities give full ownership to the student. If a professor does research, they get a percentage of profit/ income and the uni would own the research. - Insights into what it’s like to live in Australia, work for Google in the US and exposure from travelling the world.
This helped me understand certain risks & rewards that I could potentially gain by living & working in these countries with examples of challenges that even Directors at Google have to face even after working for Google in the US for over 17 years.
“In Australia, people care for each other, it’s laid back (I can attest to this from my experience as well). The US has so many opportunities for people who dream big!”
His salary increased by 50% when he moved to the US (apparently he later realised that even that amount was lower than what he probably should’ve asked for).
- Got insights into why he decided to do a PhD
He didn’t have another choice because his friends who got employed were also getting laid off even before they joined work due to the economic crisis towards the end of 2008. If money wasn’t a concern, he would’ve continued doing research in academia. - Got insights into how Google employees view other companies like Apple and what his views are.
They don’t really think about the other companies. They have a lot of mutual respect. But, the shark/ the big fish in the sea doesn’t think too much about the other small fish, whereas startups think a lot about the Googles, Apples, and Facebooks. - As I hadn’t completely ruled out the possibility of doing a Research based Masters (MPhil), there were several things that I needed to look into. The universities that offered MPhil research scholarships, their requirements, what I have, what I didn’t have. Dinuka Wije advised me on how to note down the professors, any interesting research and how I could potentially approach and identify if the chosen research & professor were a good fit for me.
These are a few other points he wanted me to consider, understand & do a background check on when deciding on a research supervisor
- Past students papers
- Speak to past students
- Expectations of supervisors — understand what they’re prioritizing.
- Identify if the Prof is clear about the research topic & the expected outputs.
- Does the Prof have industry connections? Will I have the opportunity to engage in research with industry partners?
- Where the Prof’s students have gone to after completing their PhDs.
“When the Prof would be interviewing you to see if you’re a good fit to work with them, you also need to interview them. You need to see if they’re trying to get you to get you a PhD or do research.”
- Understood the importance of an MBA & what kind of MBA is worth doing.
- It mainly helps you with Networking.
- Google particularly checks whether the mode of study of your MBA was full-time. - Learnt what is usually tested in managerial interviews.
An interviewer would usually give a scenario and ask how you would solve it. you may be given some data, to see how you try to come to conclusions by the questions you ask.
Eg: If the company is going through huge losses, how would you help mitigate losses? how would you find ways to profit?
The company is planning to expand to Europe, what do you think needs to be done?
Engineering thinking/ experience apparently helps with managerial interviews because your mind is trained to approach problems and think in the required way. - Identified managerial/ leadership qualities, with examples and experiences at Google and Accenture.
- How to create an effective resume that emphasizes my strengths.
- When writing my SOP (Statement of Purpose) & Statement of Research Interest, he wanted me to focus on the following points.
– Write a couple of stories and mention your strengths within these stories.
– Social Impact
I did this thing and it helped these people, and this is my passion and why I want to do this.
– Focus less on achievements & more on the impact & desire to impact (the change you want to make).
– Even though you haven’t done something, you can mention what you would like to do if you get the chance. - How to adjust to Australia, what to expect & what to do.
In addition to all these, I was able to validate my worth and vision from a person currently at one of the biggest tech giants in the world.
Fun fact: Apparently, dinuka@google.com was already taken when he joined the company.
I wish that I could explain all these in further detail, but if I do try doing that now, this blog would probably never get published (after being in my drafts for over 1 year, I think it’s safe to say that this is true 😅).
Total Mentoring Sessions: 14 | hours: 15+
I wish I had taken a screenshot of the suggestions that Google Dinuka placed on the Google Doc of my statement of purpose to show how much effort and time he put in even outside of our mentoring sessions.
The value of ScholarX
As most ScholarX mentees and previous mentees may have noted in their blog posts, there are many achievements/ opportunities/ networks/ guidance that the program opens up. From research publications to guidance on so many batch-topping FYPs to PhD entrees, research opportunities have been in abundance.
Check out ScholarX Success Stories.
Why I Think ScholarX is Invaluable for an Undergrad/ Graduate
I have a pretty decent network and I have been blessed with the ability to make a call across the globe and get a decent amount of information on whatever I want to know, whenever I’m at a crossroads or need any feedback on my work. But, I can certainly say that some of the things that I have been able to gain out of my mentoring sessions couldn’t have been gained from anyone that I know or by paying any amount of money, at this point in time of my life, right here from Sri Lanka in excruciatingly challenging & testing times.
I had the opportunity to open my eyes to territories I had never set foot in before, areas I had always longed to thrive in.
Personal Achievements from ScholarX Mentoring by Google Dinuka
The most prominent achievement gained out of these mentoring sessions would probably be the fact that I was offered a place at the University of Melbourne in Australia for a Master of Software Engineering course.
Of course, I may have been able to get this offer based on my transcripts and other achievements, but definitely not as fast as I did, with a clear idea of what I was getting myself into.
The mentoring that I received over the last few months helped me in the following ways for me to get this offer.
- I was able to have a proper picture of where I wanted to be in 8–15 years carrier-wise, qualifications-wise, financially, health-wise, and spiritually & based on where I wanted to live. This also helped me understand the process I needed to follow to get there.
- I was able to get an idea of what kind of things people at Google/ Silicon Valley see as important skills to have under my belt.
- He critically reviewed & suggested changes in almost all my application documents including my Statement of Purpose, Statement of Research Interest, Academic CV & Professional CV.
I used a slightly altered version of this Statement of Purpose to get awarded a scholarship from Airwallex that helps me quite significantly with my finances and industry mentoring here, at UniMelb. - Since we had mentoring sessions weekly at the beginning and then bi-weekly towards the end, I always had to put in the effort to look at courses, universities, and any other information that I needed to have in check to make decisions. It probably would’ve taken way longer than this just to figure out the country I wanted to go to for postgrad studies, if not for these sessions.
- I was able to take a leap of faith, with well-informed decision-making.
- I was able to compare and weigh my options. This made it easy for me to stay away from trying to chase side goals that would deviate me from what I really wanted (examples of side goals: going after a doctorate title/ attending an Ivy League uni).
“Having too many options is always a good headache to have.” — Dinuka Wije
What I admire about Dinuka Wije’s mentoring style is that he wasn’t trying to push the things that I felt were unnecessary onto me. For example, I understood that I didn’t want to do a PhD and he respected my decision based on my reasoning without trying to push me down that path, even though he had seen success in that path.
Potential Opportunities that I see I might be able to get exposed to in the future thanks to these mentoring sessions
- I could get a recommendation for an interview at Google (Apparently, this increases your chances by 3x).
- He’s open to investing in anything interesting or connecting me with a few VCs that he knows of in the US for potential business/ product investments.
A few additional achievements that I was able to achieve during the time period of these mentoring sessions:
- Became the Gold Medalist of my undergrad.
- Won the award for the best research project.
- Was reached out to share information regarding my research from people in extremely prestigious institutions around the world.
- Won an NBQSA (National Best Quality Software Assurance Awards) Gold Award in the consumer category.
- Runner-Up for Software Engineering Project Award (Final Year) at Cutting Edge.
- Nominated for APICTA (Asia Pacific ICT Alliance Awards) and the University of Westminster Prize (All-rounder) in Computer Science.
Having many achievements in 2022 that probably overshadow my ScholarX journey & mentoring that I received. It may be portrayed to have had a considerably small impact on my life from the outside, but I’m certain that I will look back at my life in my late 20s, 30s & 40s and see these mentoring sessions as a springboard, to take the stepping stones that I needed to take my life to where I wanted it to be in 5–15 years!
1 year later, I still believe that this mentorship is what helped me get to where I am now, this fast, with all the insightful information that I was able to gain.
In 5–10 years, I am sure that I will look back on this mentorship as the pivotal moment that propelled me into my future successes. Not the awards, accolades or achievements, this was the best thing that I got to experience in 2022.
I’ve had multiple mentors at the University of Melbourne and from Airwallex since I arrived here in Australia, who also helped me learn a lot about the industry, university life and entrepreneurship in Australia. Having said that, the mentoring that I received from Google Dinuka via SEF shines through as the brightest and broadest mentoring that I have ever received.
Physical Meetup
I had the privilege of meeting my mentor in person when he flew into Sydney a few weeks after coming to Australia.
A Final Thank You Note
First off, I would like to thank Dr. Dinuka Wijesinghe for all the time & energy he spent mentoring me, doing background checks and reviewing docs that I sent over, despite his busy life and even while taking up new challenges himself as a first-time dad!
Then I would like to thank Dr. Akshika aiya and the whole volunteering team at SEF & the ScholarX program for giving birth to this amazing mentoring program and trying their best to continue openning opportunities for Sri Lankan students!
Finally, I would like to thank all the mentors of the program for taking up volunterary mentoring roles to spread their knowledge!
