How a 24-Hour Coding Challenge Launched a Decade-Long Career at New York Life

One Sunday 10 years ago, Nishit Sadhwani signed up for an online 24-hour coding challenge sponsored by New York Life. He completed the challenge as one of the top performers and was asked to come to New York Life’s office to participate in a one-day hackathon. 

Sadhwani excelled, becoming one of the hackathon’s winners. His success led to a part-time internship at New York Life and then a full-time position on the enterprise data team. 

Sadhwani said his time at New York Life can best be described as “continuous growth.” In addition to holding several roles leading up to his current position as corporate vice president of AI and data architecture, Sadhwani took part in Stanford University Graduate School of Business’s LEAD Executive Program. He’s also become a father, and said he’s been supported by a company culture rooted in work-life balance. 

For Sadhwani, working at New York Life hasn’t just been an advantageous career move — it has redefined his life. 

“Ten years in, I can say this clearly: I am a better engineer, a better leader, a better thinker and a better human than I was when I walked in,” Sadhwani said.

Below, Sadhwani shares more about his background, what compelled him to join — and return to — New York Life, and the passion and support that surrounds him at the company.

 

 

How a Coding Challenge Led to a Full-Time Role at New York Life 

Tell us about your background and what brought you to New York Life. 

I come from a family that built things. My father, a man of few but precise words, handed me two principles that I carry like pocket change everywhere I go: “Loyalty and trust — above everything,” and, “Give 100% in what you’re doing, and everything will fall into place.”

Right out of graduate school with a master's in computer science, I had a clear mental map of where I thought I was headed – typically to one of the tech giants. Sometimes, though, the opportunities that shape you most start in less expected ways. 

At the time, I was new to the city, deep in an internship at a small startup—fewer than 50 people, the kind of place where everyone knows everyone and the energy is electric. One Sunday stretched out in front of me like a blank page, so I did what engineers do when they’re bored and slightly competitive: I found a 24-hour coding challenge. 

I finished the challenge, which happened to be hosted by New York Life. Six days later, an email arrived, inviting me to an in-person hackathon at New York Life’s offices. I went-and sometime that afternoon, something shifted.

 

How did your success during the hackathon land you a full-time role at New York Life?

The hackathon led to a part-time internship offer from New York Life Investment Management, and the projects they handed to me were not what I expected.

An Alexa skill. An app using Leap Motion — the gesture-sensing technology that lets you control computers with your bare hands. I knew it was a Fortune 100 company with a long history. What I didn’t know yet was the depth of what was being built inside it. I was intrigued enough to stay.

When the full-time offer came, it was for the enterprise data team. I became one of the first five engineers tasked with building New York Life’s big data platform — from infrastructure to application. 

I helped choose the servers, the RAM, the disk and data architecture. That is genuinely rare. 

I had a choice: join a tech giant and likely work on one feature of one product or join an established financial institution and build something foundational with real ownership. This was a generalist’s dream: infrastructure to application, security to governance, data wrangling to semantic layer. If it touched data, I would touch it.

 

Engineering Culture at New York Life: Ownership, Leadership Support and Innovation

What were some of the opportunities you had during your early years at New York Life?

When I joined New York Life, I worked long days—not because anyone asked me to, but out of pure curiosity. There was so much to build and learn, and I simply couldn’t stop. My colleagues talked about work-life balance and what made New York Life a strong employer. I nodded and kept going. I didn’t fully understand what they meant. Not yet.

My father’s second principle had always been: Give 100%, and the rest will fall into place. I was living it without realizing it. The progression that followed — the expanding scope and harder problems — didn’t feel like climbing. It felt like the natural consequence of showing up fully every day.

New York Life met that with investment of its own. When the company partly sponsored my Stanford LEAD executive program through Stanford’s Graduate School of Business, it wasn’t just a benefit. It was a signal: We see where you’re going. That kind of institutional belief changes how you carry yourself.

I’m not the only one with a story like this. Across New York Life, there are people with long tenures who started the same way — curious, committed and eager to see what they could build next.

 

“Work-life balance isn’t an HR talking point — it’s the architecture of a life. New York Life gives me the space to figure that out without losing everything I’ve built in the process.”

 

How New York Life Supports Innovation and Career Development

What are you most proud of in your time at New York Life, and what excites you most about the future?

People sometimes assume that a decade at a large institution means you’ve traded your edge for a title — that scrappiness softens and curiosity fades.

Not for me.

What I’m most proud of is having multiple opportunities to say, from a technical perspective, “I built that.” As an engineer, there is deep pride in creating solutions that have meaningful impact.

I’m also proud of stepping into challenging, high-impact situations and contributing in rooms where I may not have expected to be. Participating in technical due diligence for the GBS acquisition was one of those moments — both a stretch opportunity and a point of professional growth.

What excites me most is the shift I’m seeing in how New York Life approaches innovation. AI is a great example, as is the launch of an on-chain fund using blockchain technology. These are signals that we’re entering an exciting period — one that will reward self-starters, creative problem-solvers and people willing to think differently about what’s possible.

After 10 years, I’m a better engineer, leader and thinker than I was when I walked in. And I’m just as excited about what’s ahead as I was on day one.

 

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