Exploring Education at EPAM with Systems Engineering Team Leader Denis Azarov

Exploring Education at EPAM with Systems Engineering Team Leader Denis Azarov 

At EPAM, learning is a core part of what we do. As we strive for excellence in accordance with our core principles and ethics, we believe that knowledge fuels innovation. 

We develop our education resources and training programs with intention, allowing employees to learn, grow and lead in their field. We spoke with Denis Azarov, Systems Engineering Team Leader at EPAM Poland, who — in addition to his focus on Cloud Systems Engineering as a DevOps Team leader on a major GameDev project — creates helpful, in-demand educational content for developers.  

Engineering Meets Education  

A seasoned EPAMer with over 10 years of experience, Denis looks beyond his leadership role to break down his engineering specialty. “If you want to make it simple, I’m an Infrastructure Developer under the DevOps discipline,” he explains. 

Aside from his assigned project duties, he is committed to the education and professional development of EPAMers across the cloud discipline. “EPAM has a vast ecosystem of learning platforms and tools for learning,” says Denis. He emphasizes that this includes (and is enabled by) our learning and development (L&D) professionals, who have rich experience in creating training content for career support. “I knew I wanted to create useful educational content for my colleagues, and I found support for my ideas. That's how I joined forces with the EPAM L&D team.”

Since beginning this collaboration, Denis has become the coordinator for a collection of EPAM training programs for cloud engineers. “Most of our content is focused on practical aspects that give EPAMers skills to solve daily problems as soon as possible,” he shares. He breaks down how this kind of problem-solving is a perfect goal for their audience. “We are targeting EPAM specialists who need to upskill in a particular area — often people who have joined a new project and want to boost their skills,” he explains.  

One of these training programs is the CloudX Associate course, which focuses on AWS for DevOps specialists. Others include courses like Terraform for Cloud and Cloud Native for Developers. As one of the creators of these programs, Denis continues to review the course materials for relevance in a rapidly developing tech scene. 

A Roadmap for Education 

Denis’s passion for developing specific, targeted education resources for his colleagues is partly due to the substantial challenges that learners face. Across the industry, every role in the market requires at least a basic understanding of data, systems and automation. However, he points out that a high learning standard is particularly true for engineers. 

“We require knowledge across many domains,” he reflects. “We are expected to have a broad understanding of various technologies and how they intersect. Finding a single educational resource would be difficult.”  

Denis indicates that the complexity of a single role is a common challenge to professional development. Others include: 

• Information overload. Denis warns about the “noise” of advertising and email marketing, saying, “It’s becoming increasingly difficult to identify good resources amidst the noise.”  
• Training gaps. Experienced professionals often rely on alternative learning methods, such as blogs, articles, and peer exchange, because advanced resources are scarce. 
• Platform pitfalls. Online resources that enable students to complete assignments directly in their browser are popular among learners. Denis says this can be a negative thing: “Students are often left realizing that real life doesn’t happen in a curated learning environment.” 

Denis works hard to ensure his courses serve as solutions to these challenges, but he also recommends another essential resource: a roadmap.  

“You can create roadmaps, or they are available in many engineering communities,” he says. “In most cases, you’ll find mandatory and secondary topics, key milestones, best practices and lists of resources.” These items provide students with a starting point and can facilitate self-pacing and more efficient learning management.  

“For me, a roadmap makes my development path clearer, more flexible and less intimidating — so I procrastinate less,” Denis admits. “I focus on what is important and spend less time on secondary topics until I need them.”

He goes on to say: “From my perspective, more experienced specialists require a slightly different approach to learning.” Denis also notes that experts and advanced specialists can often benefit from putting knowledge sharing at the forefront of their learning approach. His words apply across all disciplines and skills in the IT industry: “Sooner or later, everyone reaches a point where sharing their skills and experiences with colleagues feels like the right way to contribute.”

Denis views knowledge sharing as a mutually beneficial activity that presents an excellent opportunity for developing and training everyone involved, not just mentees and students. “When you achieve something or have knowledge and skills to share — why not pass it on to others?”   

The L&D Partnership 

Regardless of ability in a particular subject, packaging a large amount of information into digestible material and organizing the learning process is a complex task that requires specific knowledge and skills. For Denis, this is where EPAM L&D comes in.  

Creating employee training is more complex than many realize. The time from ideation to course launch can take years; teams must analyze audience needs and learning goals, collaborate with subject matter experts and translate complex information into clear, engaging content. Once this information is compiled, courses undergo multiple design, review and testing stages to ensure that all information is accurate and impactful. Courses must also be accessible to and understood by a diverse group of employees. The process is deliberate, with the huge goal of helping people truly learn and apply new skills. 

Denis explains how he continues to work with the L&D department after a course is developed. “Together, we plan and organize times to run our programs. I also work with students to discuss their questions, comments and feedback,” he shares. While it is a significant undertaking, he emphasizes that this feedback and individual connection with students is especially important in helping engineers and course creators alike understand how to improve going forward.  

He shares some advice for course designers: “I highly recommend working with EPAM’s L&D team,” he advises. Our vast collection of professional resources includes catalogs of courses created by and for real IT professionals, as well as tailored learning paths and self-assessment tools. Denis also points out the benefits of becoming a course creator: “The desire to try a new approach to learning management excites and motivates me. It makes me want to dig deeper into finding ways to make a greater impact on my colleagues and their careers.” 

Are you interested in joining our team? Find your perfect fit at EPAM today! https://www.epam.com/careers