- What inspired you to pursue a tech career, especially within the automotive industry?
My interest in a tech career started in my third year of secondary school. One day, while at home, I was going through waste papers that my father had asked me to discard. And therein, I found pages of QBASIC programming codes! This remained unbeknownst to me until my final year of secondary school.
What caught my attention was the red text, because printed text is usually black. And as I continued to “study” them, I noticed a certain pattern! The instructions followed each other. It was like a step-by-step procedure to get something done or arrive at an output. This fascinated me!
Four years later, I wrote my first error-free QBASIC program! This was after studying many lines of codes and practicing with pen and paper between my classes. From QBASIC I found JavaScript, then HTML and CSS, and as they say… the rest is history.
2. Would you mind sharing some fascinating moments you’ve had through your career journey?
Throughout my career, I have had the privilege of working on different projects. From personal projects to online food ordering, banking solutions, payroll, online dating, e-commerce, human resources, government, and even hospitality.
Autochek came at a time in my career when I wanted something new and challenging. Car ownership without breaking the bank is something I have benefited from abroad, and if I could be a part of that solution in Africa, then I am aligned with Autochek’s mission.
One challenging moment was a biometric government project. It was my first time building something like this. Plus, I had to rebuild their offline intranet system as an online system that stores data offline as well.
A more recent moment was during my first quarter at Autochek. I had to work with a remote team of engineers across two time zones. My team had to migrate a major microservice and go live in a short time. Besides the tight deadline, it did not all go as planned, and took another quarter to stabilize. A very memorable and learning moment for me that was.
3. What personal values guide your professional decisions?
- “Boy Scout Rule”: I try to always leave a place or people (or codebase) better than I found it.
- Anything worth doing is worth doing well the first time, so I strive for excellence in anything I do.
4. Would you rather play golf or lawn tennis?
Lawn tennis for me, gets the body moving, the heart pumping, and the sweat rolling a lot more than golf. And these are all great for my body and mind.
5. Managing remote teams is an extreme sport. How have you pulled this off with little to no stress?
I cannot say I have pulled this off with little to no stress. It may appear that way, but I assure you… it is not. But it is a lot easier when I have a high-performing team that leverages tech and aligns with the team’s goals. Having a good boss and mentor has made things easier for me, and I cannot stress this enough.
6. What was your first mistake as a “tech bro” and how did you feel?
One of my first mistakes was at my first job in Lagos about eight years ago. I deleted the production (live) database for one of our projects by accident! It felt like the ground should open up and swallow me. Interestingly, my boss as well as the managing director did not make a big deal about it. Phew! But yeah, I went into my shell for a day or two.
7. What relaxation mechanisms do you adopt whenever you feel overwhelmed?
Whenever I am overwhelmed, I talk to a friend, tune in to a movie or TV series on Netflix, or go for a short walk. I also try breathing exercises as well as the Pomodoro technique to avoid it altogether. Irrespective of the method used, the most important thing is that I take a break.
8. What basic tech resources will you recommend to someone starting in the same career?
Three things: a good laptop, a good workstation (that is, chair and desk), and a fitness tracker.
I mentioned a good laptop, for obvious reasons. Then, when setting up your workstation at home or the office, a good chair and desk are important. People underestimate how bad it is for one’s health to sit for extended periods. So, if you are going to be sitting for long (not just in tech), then you better do it right.
A good fitness tracker can track how long you have been sitting and remind you to get up. It can also track your sleeping patterns and general fitness. Pair that with a fitness or health app, and you get analytics data to optimize your health.