Krishan Kumar Chugh decided to go for further studies in Software Engineering as it was very relevant to his job then, and it opened up a world of knowledge,and opportunities, for him.
Krishan Kumar Chugh, MTech SE (Class of 2003)
Krishan Kumar Chugh was an Assistant Manager of Quality Management (IT) in Singapore Airlines, and was doing a lot of work in Software Engineering when he found that his existing knowledge about the topic was limited.
“I did not have a formal education in Software Engineering, but my work required me to develop new processes, as well as to review and improve existing processes of the Quality Management system. Hence, I decided to enrol for the Master of Technology (Software Engineering) programme (MTech SE) in the Institute of Systems Science at the National University of Singapore (NUS-ISS),” said Krishan.
Today, Krishan is the Vice President of Technology Project Management Office at OCBC, managing systems development life cycle (SDLC), as well as the Engineering Process Group to ensure process governance and compliance.
“The MTech SE programme has been an excellent learning experience for me, where I got to refresh my knowledge and skills in project management, SDLC and engineering and learnt new knowledge and skills in business process re-engineering, formal methods and object-oriented (OO) development. It was a good mixture of practical and theoretical knowledge,” shared Krishan.
Launched since 1996, the MTech SE programme is designed for IT professionals who want to deepen their software engineering skills and become leaders of software development in their organisations. Through lectures, workshops and project work, the curriculum emphasizes the understanding and exploitation of advanced technologies and management disciplines
Krishan enjoyed the project work in the curriculum the most, “I enjoyed most of the lectures, especially in terms of learning about new areas in security and e-learning. But the best part, for me, was the real-world hands-on project work, where we got to go to an organisation and develop a project for them.”
It was quite an experience for Krishan as well, working with different IT professionals on the project. “It was challenging working with different course-mates, as we each have different priorities and working hours, balancing work with studies.”
However, looking back, despite the challenges, Krishan still recommends the MTech SE programme to budding IT professionals, “It is a really good investment for two and a half years, to develop your potential in Software Engineering.”
Krishnan’s full sharing can be found in Headhunt magazine, Jan 2015 issue here.
The next intake for MTech (SE) will be in Janurary 2016. Application will open in April 2015 – stay tuned on our website for more information closer to date.
For admission into the programme, candidates are required to have two years of relevant working experience as an IT professional in software development or maintenance. However, a waiver may be granted for candidates with highly relevant IT degrees, consistently good academic records and good practical software development knowledge.
In addition to Software Engineering, NUS-ISS also offers other Master of Technology degrees in KnowledgeEngineering (KE) and Enterprise Business Analytics (EBAC). Each programme leads to the award of a Masters degree by the National University of Singapore. Each of the programmes extends over a minimum period of two and one-half years, and a maximum of five years of part-time study. They are also available on a full-time basis over a minimum period of one and a-half years.
For more information on our MTech programmes, please visit
Graduate Programmes.