Working remotely at 3YOURMIND: Tony Thomas
3YOURMIND is an international company. Employees’ home countries are located across the world and we, as a company, almost always support working remotely. We have got employees from more than 15 different countries which could make communication more difficult, but since everyone speaks English here, and Berlin has a high percentage of English speakers, it is not really an issue.
Remote working is different since you cannot really interact directly with people and that does make communication harder. But for Tony Thomas, it was not a problem. In this article, we will tell you a little bit about him, why remote working is great and how 3YOURMIND supports working remotely.
What is your current position at 3YOURMIND?
I am working with the development team at 3YOURMIND, which is based in Berlin, on engineering the backend of our application stack. This involves writing shiny new modules and interfaces on top of our legacy E-commerce system, making it run faster and easier to integrate. I was hired because of my experience in Python, Django and web development in general, to the post of ‘Web Backend Developer’ back in May 2017.
Since you are working remotely, where are you from and where are you right now?
I was hired during my Masters degree at TU Berlin. I hail from the south of India and did my Bachelors in Computer Science at a local University there. Right now, I am in Stockholm, Sweden — finishing up my masters in Computer Networks.
What does your typical day look like?
Since I work full time, I try to start my work at least by 10:00 am in the morning (considering the aggressive Swedish climate). We have our regular stand-up meetings at 11:30 am, which I never miss attending. I work all the way til 18:00 or later, often with previously announced breaks (due to academics). We have perfect working spaces and internet here in Sweden making remote work easy. This also makes team meetings possible without major inconvenience.
How did 3YOURMIND support this move?
3YOURMIND was happy to allow my shift from being an on-site member of their development team in Berlin to a full-time remote employee. Since we have an interactive whiteboard in our development room, I get to join the standup meetings every day. Initially, there were days when I had to access my dev machine in Berlin — so we used TeamViewer setups, which did not scale much. This was replaced by a VPN solution by our dev-ops team which allows me to access objects inside our firewall with ease. 3YOURMIND was also happy to invest in essential hardware like top quality microphones which made my life easier.
Which technologies are you working with and why?
As I mentioned, most of my work revolves around the Python-Django stack and much to my relief we make sure I never have to touch the frontend. In my initial days, I was developing the backend of AMPI (Additive Manufacturing Part Identifier) using django-restframework on top of Python 3.x. Later, I was transitioned to the marketplace project where I started with removing legacy libraries from the codebase. Later, I worked on adding pluggable authentication methods like OAuth2, SAML2, JWT which allows our enterprise customers easier access to our app. Recently, the marketplace team saw a significant change in workflow as we introduced django-restframework to deliver shiny APIs, reducing the coupling between front-end and back-end.
On a personal level, I run a Debian 9 with an XFCE on top of it. Since I deal with the Python stack, my favorite IDE is PyCharm — which 3YOURMIND has acquired licenses for.
You probably have a different view on the development team’s processes because of your remote work. How does the development team work?
For me, the overview is mostly what happens on our communication (Slack) channels. We have an active #developers channel which allows for online workers like me to be totally connected with the on-site team. From my side, I think the development team is progressing fast, dissecting essential problems and figuring out solutions with decent discussions. Recently, we have also been using our mailing lists to discuss important architecture decisions which I guess is setting important standards for the team.
What are some tools remote workers should not miss?
Other than the obvious VPN clients, I can recommend Harvest which does an excellent job of time tracking, sending and collecting invoices etc. They even have a very helpful Chrome plugin which makes the whole process of time tracking easy. Modern browsers’ multiple profile features are of great help to keep your personal and work lives separated as well. On a lower level, I should also mention the Swedes’ favorite, height-adjustable tables, which can keep you healthy and focused as well.
Thanks for your time Tony, let’s continue hacking on our products 🚀
If you would like to work with Tony and the other developers, check out our openings and apply now.
