Karim Samir, Atos Origin Germany, Cologne
Karim Samir’s dream when he joined Atos Origin was to work on the Olympic Games Project. He tells us how this dream came true in Beijing.
Karim joined the IT-Team in Beijing at the beginning of 2008, and now works in the Digital Headquarters on the Olympic Games site in Beijing. He works 12 hour shifts in the Technical Operations Centre managed by Atos Origin, but there are compensations. “The anticipation is rising almost unavoidably, because I can observe the preparations every single day by just looking out of the window”, he explains. “When I arrived, it didn’t look as if everything would be ready in time. The Olympic Green looked like a huge building site. But as I saw hundreds of workers planting thousands of trees within a very short time, my opinion changed“
“If you travel here without prejudices you can explore a lot and everything remains very exciting. Of course, especially the job is exciting. Three and a half years ago, when I applied at Atos Origin I already hoped that I could take part at the Olympic Games one day. The fact that this has come about so quickly, I would never have thought. The work is just wonderful, a dream”, Karim tells me enthusiastically.
Karim works in the Helpdesk IT and other Technology, it is the first authority if problems appear in any of the venues. As first level support he tries to offer the first assistance to the customers. In the case of more complicated problems he forwards the customers to the responsible colleagues. “We couldn’t rely on experience from previous Games for this since there wasn’t a central Helpdesk up to now“, he explains to me.
Karim also has to do personnel planning in Beijing; a new job for him. He has been involved in hiring his team members, and refining training drafts. “It is fantastic to work with them, they vouch for each other and are really good in what they do.”, he explains proudly. “Even if there are only small problems, we are professional and we always try to help our customers in a professional manner. Every problem is recorded and solved carefully”, he says to me seriously.
Even if he falls in his bed dead tired after 12 hours of work, he wouldn’t like to change his job at the moment. ”It simply makes a lot of fun to work here and to ensure, with all my colleagues, that we’ll have great Games.”
When Karim Samir returns to his usual position in Cologne, he’ll be bringing new skills back from Beijing and some truly unique experience that he can share with future clients.