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Sigu Magwa

A Teacher, Software Engineer, ex Electrical Eng

I am a proficient software developer with strong technical expertise, business acumen, and leadership abilities. Effective in asynchronous communication, I excel in remote team collaborations. I work well with cross-functional teams to solve end-user problems and have a strong track record of mentoring developers through pair programming.

My entrepreneurial spirit is evident in founding https://podiihq.com, where I am involved in brainstorming, prototyping, and releasing web and mobile applications. I work closely with product managers and stakeholders to address business needs and make high-level architectural decisions. As a team lead I provide technical guidance and leveraged team members' strengths to achieve project goals.

Committed to community involvement, I organized ElixirConf Africa and coordinate Elixir Kenya. I enjoy mentoring, volunteering, and giving talks, fostering a collaborative and informative environment.

sigu speaking

My work experience

Here's what I have been up to

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Sept 2022 - Sept 2023 - remotely Senior Engineer - Contract
Working with an async remote team distributed all over the world.
  • Rewriting existing codebase to improve performance
  • Improving developer experience across the different projects
  • Occasionally working on infrastructure upgrades and improvements.
  • Ensuring proper CI/CD with Jenkins and Docker
  • Performing regular code reviews and Collaborating with fellow engineers

Highlight: Improved a function running for more than a minute to 3 seconds

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Jan 2022 - July 2022 - remotely Software Engineer - Contract
Working with a purely async remote team with minimal meetings.
  • Migrating existing codebase into a new application framework
  • Rewriting existing codebase to improve performance
  • Designing and writing solid and scalable code while building new features and services
  • Performing regular code reviews
  • Collaborating with fellow engineers

Highlight: Improved communication skills to favor async remote teams

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October 2021 - Dec 2021 - remotely Software Engineer - Contract
Working with the Creative Cloud team as a back-end engineer.
  • Rewriting existing codebase to improve performance
  • Designing and writing solid and scalable code while building new features and services
  • Performing regular code reviews
  • Collaborating with fellow engineers and project managers

Highlight: Integrating into a new culture takes time and intentional efforts

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Feb 2021 - Oct 2021 - remotely Software Engineer - Contract
Back-end engineer turning ideas into beautifully written code.
  • Rewriting existing codebase to improve performance
  • Designing and writing solid and scalable code while building new features and services
  • Writing and maintaining living documentation including improvement of onboarding process
  • Collaborating with fellow engineers and project managers

Highlight: A big monolith can work

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Feb 2018 Founder & CEO
Leading a team of software developers and consultants in delivering innovative solutions to clients.
  • Overseeing the development and deployment of software projects for various industries
  • Collaborating with clients to understand their business needs and provide tailored solutions
  • Managing the company's operations, including budgeting, hiring, and client relations
  • Implementing agile methodologies to streamline project management and delivery
  • Ensuring high-quality standards through regular code reviews and testing

Highlight: Successfully grew the company from a small startup to multiple working with clients

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Jan 2017 - Nov 2017 - remotely Software Developer and Coach
Working in a fast-paced Agile-based development environment.
  • Practicing agile development methodologies
  • Writing, modifying, and debugging software for clients
  • Developing code to complete assigned projects by deadlines

Highlight: Teaching new software concepts is always fun

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Oct 2014 - Oct 2015 Cofounder and Software Developer
Working on a small Agile team in a startup environment.
  • Brainstorming with team members to come up with new mobile application concepts
  • Working with stakeholders to gather functional and technical requirements
  • Creating wireframes and prototypes to test our ideas
  • Participating in MVP and product demos
  • Utilizing automated and manual methods to test our code
  • Facilitating releases of software upgrades

Highlight: Not knowing how to do it but having an end goal is a drive enough to get up in the morning

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July 2013 - May 2014 Electrial Engineer
Working with a multidisciplinary team on commercial building projects.
  • Designing electrical systems for new construction and renovation projects
  • Creating detailed electrical drawings and specifications
  • Collaborating with architects and other engineers to ensure integration of electrical systems
  • Conducting site inspections and overseeing the installation of electrical systems
  • Performing load calculations and energy efficiency assessments

Talks

Check out some of my talks

Building and growing the community Building and growing the Elixir community in Kenya through shared learning and projects. The focus is on supporting and encouraging members
Observability In software Applications A plane crash in 2007 and how data recorders, known as black boxes, help investigate such incidents and emphasizes the importance of these recorders and relates to software observability.
Keynote: Building an Emergency Software The process of building emergency software and the challenges faced by the developers. We highlight the importance of community involvement and the need for continuous learning and testing.
Understanding GenServers Understanding Elixir GenServers and how they manage processes and communication. GenServers help solve problems with concurrency and interprocess communication in Elixir
Standing in the shoulders of giants Talk about programming languages like Elixir, Ruby, and Clojure, focusing on how the laguages were all born from the foundations of well established languages born years before them
Concept of CI/CD I covered how you can effectively collaborate on software projects and ways of deploying it out to the world. Collaboration, communication, and automation

Podcasts