Ahmed Gadir: Great Software Engineering Teams

by Jeff Bond

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Chat Guest

Ahmed was born the second of six children in Washington, DC in 1976 to a Veterinary Microbiologist father and businesswoman mother from Sudan. He traveled the world with his family, growing up in the UAE, Egypt, Oman, and Europe before moving back to the United States at age 16. Ahmed still maintains his love of travel to this day. He graduated from Georgia State University with a BS in Computer Informations Systems. He has 20 years’ experience in the industry working for such companies as Coca Cola, Turner Broadcasting, Netroadshow, NCR, and RDA. He is currently a Senior Development Manager at Safe-Guard International in Atlanta, GA. In his free time, he enjoys riding motorcycles, traveling the world, photography, digital art, and enjoying technical blogs.

Chat Highlights

What is the secret sauce that makes a great software development team and what is your responsibility as a leader to foster these conditions?
How do you create a flexible work culture (a change from the “typical” 9-5 schedule) while getting things done and ensuring that your team is accountable for what they need to deliver on their projects?
How do you approach delivering feedback to your team members, course correcting, and aligning (or re-aligning) them into better positions that leverage their strengths?
How do you drive a team culture where healthy conflict, open debate, and sharing opinions openly is not only safe but encouraged?
When you reflect on the following recommendation from a former direct report, what sense of pride around this accomplishment should you feel as a leader?
1. Ahmed is, hands down, the best manager that I have ever had the honor to work within my career. He is incredibly driven and passionate about his work and has never hesitated to give 120% of himself when the need arises. His technical skills are incredibly sound, covering a wide range of technologies and architectures, and he has a knack for pushing the products he’s responsible for to the next level of innovation. More important than his work, however, is the way he treats his team. Day or night, seven days a week, Ahmed has been there to help us out, give us feedback, and help drive us to be better in everything we do. I have seen him give up countless evenings and weekends to help his team through tough times, and he never hesitates to drop everything he’s doing to lend a listening ear. He is always in the trenches with us…which is a quality that is increasingly rare in today’s job market. Ahmed is an incredible mentor to me…someone who has helped me spread my wings, and who has made me a better person by knowing him. For a technical leader…and for someone who truly cares about the people he works with…you will find no one better.
What makes keeping up with bleeding-edge technology and being an effective techncial team manager so complicated?