2021 in Review

2021 has been a formidable year of learning and self-discovery. I started the year with this question constantly on my mind: what’s my next step? 

I left Benin at the end of 2020 without a return flight and not many plans. I had spent 2020 waiting for change, and change came from an unexpected direction. Moved to Paris.

Professionally

In my apartment, waiting for more change, I heard about Orbit, a Silicon Valley company, from Josh, the CTO. Looked like the next step, a meaningful mission, and fun founders. A week after my interview, I was in.

First job ever as an employee. Employee #4. A lot of change. The only constant: building software.

I spent the next 8 months contributing to every part of the codebase, building much-awaited features, working with customers, fixing bugs, and handling incidents. Loved it.

But my heart was guiding me towards my zone of genius. And because software is people, I discovered that I preferred growing people and organizations more than building software.

Before Orbit, I was, for 6 years, CTO and VP of Engineering at Etrilabs, where I led the organization’s growth from 0 to more than 10 cross-functional teams.

After a few months at Orbit, I started working on engineering processes, documentation, identifying and addressing blockers to team productivity, hiring and culture. We split the team into two, and my role changed to Engineering Manager.

The next step was found. I don’t have all the answers, but I’m happy to help the now 15 engineers grow and perform as highly as possible. It’s a lovely bunch working remotely from 3 continents, and we’re building great software and culture.

Personally

I got married in November.

This newsletter

Writing helps me structure my thoughts. I’ve maintained several blogs in the past for short periods (Random Thoughts, Les Petites Différences) when I needed to organize my thoughts. This one is about engineering leadership.

I’ll be writing for myself to put words on my past and present experiences, crystalizing my leadership philosophy. If you like it, please subscribe and tag along!