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Meet the Orbit Engineering Team: Basile Barrincio

Engineering
February 16, 2022
Alex Morton
Software Engineer
Meet the Orbit Engineering Team: Basile Barrincio
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Welcome to the Meet the Orbit Engineering Team blog series! We're diving into learning about the awesome engineers at Orbit and what it's like to be a part of the team. Enjoy!

Today, we're chatting with Basile Barrincio, a software engineer on the team based in Cotonou, Benin.

Let’s start with two truths and a lie about yourself.

  1. I come from a family of 12 women and I’m the only man.
  2. I dream of traveling around the world
  3. My favorite meal is "La pâte avec le gombo."

Which statement was the lie above?

The lie is that I come from a family of 5 women (not 12) and I'm the only man.

I want to travel around the world, and one of the places I would absolutely like to visit is Bali.

Tell us about your path into tech and how you ended up at Orbit.

I remember that after college I wanted to study medicine, it was my first choice. There was also computer science among my choices because I have always been fascinated by websites and learning more about the subject interested me as much as medicine. So I chose medical school, and a polytechnic, and I got a scholarship for the latter. That's how my adventure in tech began.

After polytechnic, I worked on several projects with companies, organizations and individuals in various fields, with a particular interest in health, education and culture.

I found Orbit through a friend who worked there, and the first thing I liked was how they described the team they were trying to build. Diversity, persistence, kindness, curiosity... these are some of the words they used to describe the team, which really aligned with my own values! The other thing that captivated me is the Orbit Model. This approach to community that they were developing – I found it revolutionary!

Before Orbit, I worked on different startups over the years, but most didn't take off. I thought it must be very exciting and challenging to work on a growing product that has raised funds. So I decided to apply and a few weeks later I joined the team. And since then, it's been a real pleasure for me to contribute to the growth of Orbit.

What does a typical day at work look like for you?

Usually I start the day by taking a look at the meetings I will have during the day. I see the ones that need to be prepared and I decide which times of the day I will devote to their preparation.

After that I take a good dose of porridge (aklui, tapioca, abokoun, quaker, manwè... (we have all kinds here in Benin!) before starting with the work of the day: writing code, deploying PR, discussing feedback on PR, reviewing code, doing pair programming, and of course taking part in meetings.

What’s a feature or project you’re most proud of that you worked on in the past three months?

Definitely the Organizations profiles. This feature was a completely new thing in the app, and we built almost all parts from scratch. It was the first feature on which I worked from the start since I joined Orbit and it was very challenging and rich in learning.

What’s your favorite thing about working at Orbit?

People’s willingness to help others, and they do so in many ways, from pair programming sessions to spontaneous responses in Slack to writing all kinds of documentation... There is also the opportunity to work on a startup that is growing rapidly and to contribute to this growth.

Describe the type of person that would thrive as a member of Orbit’s engineering team.

Two seemingly contradictory words come to mind: independent and collaborative.

Everyone is responsible for their code, from the time it is written, through production and beyond, but also everyone really tries to make themselves available to help each other and move the overall work forward.

I think that to thrive within the team you really have to be able to reconcile the two. And beyond the code, it requires good communication from everyone.

What is your current favorite gem, library, tool, or anything else that helps you with your work? Why?

I do not have any favorites. For me, they are above all tools and they help us to do things. For some, super cool things, but they are still tools, and they are useful in very specific contexts. So I've never been interested in knowing which one is my favorite.

Lastly, where can people find or connect with you online?

Find me on LinkedIn and Twitter!

The latest buzz about Basile

We asked other Orbit engineers what it's like to work with Basile, and here are some of their responses:

Basile always has positive vibes when you work with him, so it’s very helpful to work with him when you want to get things done. I always enjoy discussing new features with him.

– Eric Degboe, Software Engineer

Basile is a great teammate and he is really dedicated to building great features for Orbit! It was a joy to watch his progress with Eric on the Organizations profiles.

– Alex Morton, Software Engineer

Like what you're reading and curious about joining the Orbit engineering team? 👇

💫  Orbit is Hiring Engineers in US/EMEA

Orbit helps grow and measure thousands of communities like Kubernetes and CircleCI. We're a remote-first company with a product-driven, empathetic engineering team that enjoys the occasional space pun! Check out our careers page for open opportunities.

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