How IT professionals work. Andrey Smirnov, Development Team Leader at Rambler Digital Solutions

We continue to ask specialists about the mode of work and rest, professional habits, the tools they use, and much more.

It will be interesting to find out what unites them, in what they contradict each other. Perhaps their answers will help to identify some general patterns, useful tips that will help many of us.

Today our guest is Andrei Smirnov, he has been working at Rambler Digital Solutions since 2015. Over the year, it grew from the usual frontend developer to the head of the client application development team.
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What do you do in the company?

I lead a group of about 20 frontend developers, help them with technical and career growth, conduct code review and answer for the quality of the code they write.

One word that best describes how you work?

One will not work, but the two are perfect. I solve problems. The problems of their employees, projects and so on.

How many hours a day do you spend on work?

About 9-10 hours a day: I arrive at about 10 in the morning, I leave at 7-8 in the evening. But there are also days especially busy with events and important negotiations, when you leave at 11 pm.

How many hours do you sleep?

I try to give sleep at least 7 hours, ideally I get enough sleep for 8-9 hours.

How do you have breakfast?

I don’t like to eat in the morning, so I usually limit myself to a cup of tea. Sometimes in the mornings I cook for myself porridge or scrambled eggs, but more often I have breakfast already in the office, since we have free breakfasts.

What are you doing on the way to / from work?

I have a rather interesting way to work: first, I drive a car from home to the nearest metro station, leave the car there and sit in the subway. In the car, I usually look through the headlines on Lenta.ru, read sports news or take a book out of my backpack and read. On the way from the subway to the office I usually listen to music or some podcasts.

What kind of todo-manager do you use personally?

At first I used "Notes", as they are conveniently synchronized between all my gadgets from Apple (iPhone, iPad and working MacBook). At first, I simply brought in my entire flow of working thoughts and tasks, and then structured them. But in the end I switched to Todoist, which now saves me a huge amount of time.

What applications and services can't you do without?

Firstly, without Google services. Google Docs, Google Keep are indispensable helpers for every day. Secondly, without messengers, since negotiations occupy a significant part of the working day. For this purpose, I use Slack and Telegram, as well as Skype for interviewing. And, of course, the previously mentioned "Notes" and Todoist, as well as Outlook - without mail and calendar, nowhere.

What kind of task manager / issue tracker / repository do you use in the company?

Yes, in principle, like everyone else: task manager and issue tracker - JIRA, documentation in Confluence, version control system - git, for corporate code we use GitLab, for open source GitHub.

What other tools and software do you use at work?

I have one of the standard sets of working tools in Rambler & Co: MacBook Pro 15 and a 24-inch Dell monitor. From software I have licenses to Sketch and Photoshop, like most frontend developers have. Also, a sufficient number of frontend'er like to use different IDEs for editing code (WebStorm, PyCharm, RubyMine), but in the old way I simply use the text editor Sublime Text for these purposes.

Does the company have internal projects?

Yes, and a lot of them. For example, we have an internal service for using our own Rambler & Co library, which, in essence, is an online magazine, where people say who has what book on their hands and when they plan to return it.

Of course, not to mention our internal portal, which even won several prestigious awards among corporate portals. For employees, it is a social network with a variety of convenient electronic services, such as booking a conversation, but not only that is remarkable in it. For the HR department, for example, there is a special CRM, where the full path of the hiring and firing of employees goes electronically.

From the latter, a tool was developed for development managers that automates many of the routine tasks of a manager. For example, there you can in one click arrange for an employee to work from home or participate in a conference, and also set goals for development.

What annoys you most when you work?

Annoying when you are needed everywhere at the same time: by phone, in correspondence, at an interview and at a couple of important meetings with the business. But in general, this is partially solved with the help of a well-planned calendar, and in general I am a good-natured and not very irritable person (smiles).

What professional literature would you recommend?

To be honest, I don’t really perceive professional management literature, although the same “45 manager tattoos” left an interesting aftertaste.

And as a former frontend developer, I can advise all novice javascripters to learn Flanagan from cover to cover. Well, Design Patterns from the "Gang of Four" is very memorable at the time.

What do you prefer: electronic reading rooms or paper books?

In the case of paper books, of course, the sensations of reading are quite different. I still have the habit of reading the reading list for the summer to the holes (smiles). So in the case of fiction, I will definitely buy a paper book. Unfortunately, the very professional literature is sometimes hard to get in paper binding, so you have to read on the iPad.

What technique and why do you prefer at work and at home?

Fortunately, a MacBook worker can be carried home, so it smoothly turned into my best friend, not only at work, but also at home. I got used to it so quickly that I almost completely refused to use my old laptop on Windows. An old iPhone 5 and iPad Mini 2 serve faithfully, but more is needed (smiles).

There is also the already mentioned Kia car, on which I, however, only came to work a few times when I was working on weekends. I almost do not drink coffee and do not use television, so I have neither a coffee machine nor a TV.

What do you listen when you work?

His colleagues, as most of the day passes in all sorts of meetings. And in the workplace I prefer silence or, in extreme cases, some quiet music in headphones, under which you can concentrate in moments of particularly noisy discussions in open space.

Which life hack allows you to be more efficient?

Some time management helps: every morning I watch all the tasks for the day and plan them by the hour, trying to do all the most difficult tasks as early as possible, preferably before lunch. Such a scheme works quite successfully, since all the main meetings and talks take place after lunch, and even if you don’t have time to do something planned, it will not be the top priority.

Well, in general: do not waste time, I sometimes regret very much that it is not 48 hours a day.

What kind of professional advice for the future can you give yourself?

Have a clear position and defend it if necessary. In the work of the manager, especially after moving to her from the post of programmer, there are moments where you want to compromise and be kinder than you need with your former colleagues, and now your subordinates. Such cases give the necessary experience of management, after which, looking back, you realize how many things could be solved much more effectively.

What would you recommend to a person trying to go the same way?

First, get a good education. I graduated from VMK MSU and probably would not have been where I am now if I had dropped out. And may fundamental education in Russia, as a rule, not teach you specific cases that you would immediately apply at work after graduation, but it structures the mind and allows you to learn any task as soon as possible.

Secondly, find the right first job. Ideally, in the first place of work they will not only immediately ask you for the result, but also actively train and develop you. For such expenses, large IT companies are usually ready to go, so I advise them.

And finally, do what you like and invest your soul in it - it always gives an excellent result. And do not be afraid of something new, comprehend the unknown and achieve incredible success in previously not mastered areas.