21 / 09 / 2015

Meet The Team - Byju John, Technical Director

Author

Faye Hodgkiss

Category

Blogs

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Byju heads up our development team, there's not a problem he can't solve, a maths equation he can't answer or an IT issue he can't fix. Whilst he is great at anything technical, he's not all that great at drinking beer, but thats a story for another time...

 

What is it about Absolute, which made you want to come here?
Absolute for me was the first step in my career as a web developer. The vision and passion of the company created the ideal environment for me to learn and develop, and the fact that I could gain experience in all aspects of web development was really appealing.


What were you doing before you came here?
I developed desktop applications for quite a few years when I was back in India. I was a partner of a large company developing software for the retail market. After I moved to the UK in 2005, I didn't get a job in IT for a couple of years due to my lack of UK experience. I worked for Royal Mail for a couple of years, whilst doing freelance and voluntary work to gain experience, this then gave me the confidence to go for a role in an agency.


What does an average day involve in the studio for you?
Normally I’m working on a ‘main’ project, usually a complex web build, and then I will have a list of smaller projects, which tend to be things such as developing functionality for existing clients. And as a lot of the projects we are involved in are complex, there are usually a lot of internal development meetings to be had!


What has been your favourite project at Absolute so far?
I’ve been here for 6 years and worked on hundreds of projects, and I couldn’t really name a favourite, we put 100% into each one, and I think that’s what makes it such a great place to work. I must admit though, I do enjoy a challenge, and one of the most challenging was H2.


What’s on your playlist at the minute?
This week it was some nostalgic Indian music and few playlists of A R Rahman.


Favourite place you’ve ever visited
It’s too difficult to narrow it down to a city or town, I love any place with lots of greenery and hills! I recently went to the Isle of Arran, and it was beautiful. But my all-time favourite is a beautiful spot near the dam in my hometown in India (Idukki, Kerala) it is amazing!


An interesting fact.
I used to mimic sounds (not anymore, just in case anyone asks) and I won first place for six consecutive years at the school talent competition.


Favourite TV Show at the minute? 
I am not a TV addict, instead I like to watch Jeffrey Way's amazing presentations. But if I had to choose, my favourite show would be Dragons' Den. It is amazing to see how people can dream up something no one else has ever thought of, and it’s always interesting to see how the investors assess the ideas. I also don’t like missing BBC Click.


Where do you go for inspiration? 
My major source of information and inspiration is mainly through my Flipboard feed, which include feeds from 35 different topics from Open Source to Object Oriented Programming. Even though I don’t personally tweet much, I spend a lot of time reading the tweets.