Sam is one of our new developers and splits his time between his home in Norwich and our London Office.
What does a Backend Developer do?
I work on all the parts of the platform you don’t see. I am an invisible artisan, and if I’m doing my job well you’ll never know I exist.
If I’m doing my job badly, using our software would be a bit like trying to drive a banged up old mini on the motorway. It might run, but it will be slow, bumpy and you might end up screaming (albeit out of frustration, rather than terror as another lorry threatens to squash you).
Describe a typical day
It’s all too easy to develop a myopic tunnel-vision when it comes to writing code. This is especially true of squashing troublesome bugs. A developer might spend hours bashing away at a problem and get nowhere; it is only when they review it all with fresh eyes that the solution presents itself.
Keeping this in mind, I endeavour not to spend too much time focused on one thing. I spend my mornings working on a variety of tasks if I can (or at least different parts of the same task), making a judgement on which will take the most time and effort to accomplish. Then in the afternoon, I’ll shut down the outside world and hack away at it.
Why did you join CareLineLive?
Our Director of Development (Dec) and the Backend Team Leader (Giulio) convinced me that working at CLL offered an opportunity to do my best work and help a lot of people at the same time. It wasn’t a hard sell.
Best part of the job
Building features I know people will use and get a significant real-world benefit from.
Worst part of the job
Being able to admit defeat and ask for help when you come up against an insoluble problem is a valuable skill in my line of work. That doesn’t mean I enjoy it when it happens.
What do you enjoy most about working at CareLineLive?
I take pleasure in learning more about a care ecosystem I have little personal experience of. The more I learn, the more value I can offer to people in home care.
What is something that people in home care have to deal with that you want to help fix?
At CarelineLive, we’re all aware of the challenges faced by people in home care, and helping to alleviate those difficulties is the mission that drives our team. But if I needed to choose one thing to focus my effort on, it would be loneliness. It’s a disease that can’t be cured with medicine, yet afflicts so many people.
Our work offers service users a chance to grow and develop their businesses through efficiency and cutting-edge technology. And if that means a more consistent experience, with more time for small social niceties and more chances for people in home care to develop relationships with their carers, I’ll consider it a victory worth celebrating.
Surprising or a fun fact about you
I am Batman.
