I'm Nadayar Enegesi, Dir. of Learning, Andela. ASK ME ANYTHING!

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Hey folks,

I’m Nadayar [call me Nad :slight_smile: ]. Since we started Andela in 2014, I’ve been leading a world class team in building the necessary curricula and learning programs for accelerating human transformation from tech-curious to tech leader.

For those who haven’t encountered Andela yet, we’re a global engineering organization that connects leading technology companies and talented software developers from around the world.
It’s been quite the journey growing with Andela over the past nearly three years and this afternoon, we’re announcing some pretty big news and marking a major milestone in that journey.
I’d like to invite you all to ask me and Country Director Seni Sulyman, any questions you might have. Both about the announcement and anything else Andela related. We’ll be online from 5:30pm to 7:00pm.

Cheers!

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Hi Nad,

Thanks for this opportunity. How can other organizations - big, small etc. - benefit from Andela’s learnings in crafting a curriculum, building a team of trainers, talent managers, choosing a technology stack and the appropriate set of learning resources to recommend to new hires?

Do you have any literature, case study, blog you can refer us to that practically shares your team’s experience in building your teams at Andela?

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Hello Nadayar. How do you do?

I’ve always wanted to know what andela’s curriculum is like?
I know they teach web dev technologies like php-laravel, python-django etc.

I want to know if you cover more technical concepts or topics that you would find in any international CS course especially the theoretical ones.

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Hey Aniedi!

Thanks for the question.

You’re right in that, we have learned a lot about what makes a world-class developer. The technical abilities needed at different stages, the team skills needed to build solid collaborative relationships, and how to design learning environments to enable rapid fire learning.

We know that one day, we will package the learning materials and frameworks we’ve been building and share them with the world. Moreover, that is core to our mission of distributing opportunities.

However, until we figure out the best way to package and deploy those materials, we’ll be dropping nuggets from our learnings through our medium blog posts.

You can start by diving into how we created a Developer Simulations program to rapidly upskill technologists in web development from this Medium Post.

For other general Andela learnings, you can start consuming all our posts on our Technology & Learning publication.

And thank you, Aniedi, for indirectly suggesting some topics for us to write about! Keep the ideas coming! :slight_smile:

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Hi Michael,

Thanks for creating an opportunity for us to demystify our curriculum a little bit.

Our curriculum is broken down into different technology roles with specific learning units of knowledge, behaviors, and beliefs of every skill required to excel at those roles at the global level.

Some examples of those roles are Developer, Senior Developer, Software Architect, Technical Team Lead, Product Manager, etc.

The skills for these roles are inclusive of technical skills, team skills, and tools that are specific to the role.

For example, as a Developer, the learner must master technical skills of Design Patterns, Algorithms, Data Structures, 2-3-tier architecture, etc. They must also master team skills like Relationship Building, Stakeholder Management, Motivation & Commitment, and about 15 other team skills. They have to be one with their tools like the Command Line, Git, Google Hangouts, Slack, and other tools they need to thrive as globally employable developers in distributed environments.

And we create curricula like this for every role we support. For the Developer roles, we cover Javascript, PHP, Python, Ruby, Android, and iOS. We have begun to also expand our curriculum to support DevOps and Test Engineer paths as well :slight_smile:

Does that help?

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Hey Nad, would it be safe to assume the age of the majority of Uganda’s population played a part in Andela’s decision to open up shop there? I’d also like to know what interested the team the most about the country while collecting data for assessment.

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Hi @Wayne, Seni here. Great question! Uganda does have a very large young population, and we found many super exciting and enthusiastic Ugandans who think Andela is awesome. That said, our entry into Uganda was actually as a result of several very important factors. Great ICT infrastructure, high quality of education and talent, tech of tech hubs, excitement from many corners of Uganda about what we’re doing, and a solid level of commitment from the country itself to see businesses come in and thrive. Age definitely played a role, in tandem with many of these other factors.

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Hi Nadaya
i applied for Andela Kenya last month and did the plum test but i was not taken, i wish to ask if going to redo it as part of my application process for Andela Nigeria this month?

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And just to give some insight into some the excitement and raw inspiration we felt after visiting Kampala, here are some overheads from the amazing folks we met and interacted with:

“We need to create an environment here that champions the fire starters and the torchbearers and get healthy doses of regular refueling”

“I have all these ideas and I want to build them from a position of leadership”

“I love people, I want to have real people impact, not just global dreams”

“If we’re going to have substantial impact, we need to make it here. We export our ginger raw and we import it processed. I want to create the machines that process the ginger here”

“Andela can serve as an example of what it looks like to care and to share and to build for others as much as for yourself”

The data we gathered was buttressed by the human connections we made there. And we knew Andela could call Uganda home :slight_smile:

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What’s the most important quality you look out for during talent recruitment? It’s often said that talent is never enough, so how do you find a nice balance? @senisulyman @nadayar

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Hi Pila,

Since you are re-applying to a different Andela center, you’ll have to retake the plum test. If you re-apply to Andela Kenya, you do not have to retake the test.

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@Wayne Andelans are EPIC. Those four letters represent our values - Excellence, Passion, Integrity and Collaboration. When we look for new Andelans, we are very focused on these four qualities. This translates to people who are lifelong learners and hungry for feedback, who have he highest levels of integrity, who have grown to become passionate about becoming world-class, and who believe that 1+1=11 when it comes to working with others. These are equally important (if not more than) to the technical skills that people typically focus on.

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Hi there Nad !
Can you also answer questions on twitter with the hashtag #AndelaUganda?

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Responded here.

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Sorry about the late question?

I read a thread on here some months ago about Andela’s policy with trainees IP and how they’re required to write them down.

What if you already have a product/software before joining Andela, a you still restricted from working on it? What are the rules?

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Hi Nad,

Do developers get to choose their technology preference when joining Andela. Say I want to be a web dev or mobile developer. Or does Andela choose for them?

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Hi Nad, Are older newbie developer (30 - 35 upwards) allowed to participate in the andela program?

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Thanks a lot

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Hi Nad, How can I go from zero to hero with regards to product management ?