Introduction

In this age of AI and all possible distractions and short attention spans, I'm coming to realize that writing is a powerful tool for thinking and clarifying my thoughts. Even as I type this out, I've just had to turn off autocomplete lol. My goal here is to continue use this blog as a tool to refine my thinking, get clarity and express myself, views, fears and aspiration. If you've somehow found yourself here, then I hope you at least enjoy reading some of my ramblings.

Topics I'd be writing about

In this space, I hope to write about the following areas of my general life:

• Software Engineering and Productivity
• Traveling (I do travel quite often, so maybe a few pictures here and there)
• Investing
• LeetCode and Interview Prep
• PhD Prep and Applications
• Building my Tech Startup: Collections

Software Engineering and Productivity

For the first few years of my career, I approached work in reactively and didn't really participate in meetings and events mostly because I was smothered with other very respected experts and geniuses in my team. Now on one hand, I felt lucky I got the privilege to work alongside these extremely smart engineers, but also it indirectly stifled my growth in general as an engineer as I started to get into the lazy habit of just letting them "figure it out". After all, they were the experts and would eventually figure something smart out.

But in the last 2-3 years, that has all change. I've been working in a smaller team, still with really smart people, but I was now the "expert" for react-native on my team and it put me in a position to develop my soft skills and leadership skills immensely. I started approaching differently, caring more and getting more visibility, and equally raises, praises and commendations from stakeholders. I've been also quite fortunate to be in a very receptive team where there's not too many experts and a good amount of mid level folks, this has allowed me to try certain behavioral adjustments and get realtime feedback on things.

In this blog, I'll be writing about the communication skills and leadership lessons I've learnt, mistakes I've made, and what I've learned overall

Traveling

Nigeria, USA, UK.

I've been going back and forth between these countries in the last 2-3 years, and I plan to write about my trips/journeys here. I'm from Nigeria, so Nigeria is home. I did my masters in the UK, University of Chester, so I have residency there till 2027. My two beautiful sisters live in the US, so I always go for the summers to spend time with them. I absolutely always enjoy my time in the US, the warmth of the people over there and spending time with my siblings. The UK's a great country to live in, but ultimately I (as a black african man) feel like immigrants have been portrayed quite badly by the media and government in England in the last few years and blamed for almost everything that's gone wrong in the UK, so I don't feel so welcomed.

So, yeah, I'll be writing about my travels and trips here, and maybe sharing some pictures here and there.

Investing

Lately I've become more worried about what the future would look like. AI is becoming so capable, and I honestly don't know what the future holds, so I'm leaning on the side of investing my resources and building something that compounds and brings in income while I continue to focus on delivering the most value for my employer and joining big tech where I can get a bigger bang for my hard work. I also want to start investing in agriculture in Nigeria, and I want to write about that here as well. I plan to also invest in secure Treasury bonds and index funds, so I'll be writing about that here too!

LeetCode and Interview Prep

I want to use this blog as a way to document my journey and progress in leetcode and interview prep. I want to share my thoughts on the best resources, the best strategies, and the best ways to prepare for interviews and get the best compensation for my skills as I mentioned above lol. I've solved over 70 problems this year alone, and I want to keep grinding and improving, so I'll be writing about that here.

PhD Prep and Applications

Part of my long term goals is to get a PhD in Computer Science, so I want to use this blog as a way to document my journey and progress in that area as well. I'll be writing about the best resources, the best strategies, and the best ways to prepare for PhD applications and get into a good program. My goal is to get into a good program in Canada, so in preparations for that, I'll be working on a few "portfolio" projects to build up me research experience and potentially get some publications, so I'll be writing about that here as well.