Category: Leadership

ETHGlobal Hackathon London 2024

As always lately, I have been constantly behind with my posts here on my blog 😭 BUT today is the day!

So, I just wanted to share my experience as a mentor at the ETHGlobal Hackathon this past March. It was super fulfilling, and I highly recommend that everyone join, maybe not as a mentor but definitely as a hacker at least once a year.

To check the projects we had on that day, check this link.

My favourites are:

  • HackerScore – A social network for developers looking to showcase their skills ⭐️
  • 0xmedusa-zt3is – Open source web3 commerce infra for Eth protocol integrations into Web2 infra.
  • GeoNouns – Collect Nouns across the world and mint them Pokemon Go Style.
  • OffBlocks Pay – Open Banking for Web3 – an account-to-account experience for e-commerce ⭐️
  • Monitrum – trustless and permissionless transaction monitoring solution along with support for Forced Inclusion on Arbitrum.
  • Tensor Royale – Incentivized on-chain AI collaboration platform, enabling permissionless upload of training data and computational AI models.
  • DataCat – We are a decentralized data labeling platform and marketplace to gamify building unbaised datasets. ⭐️
  • Forge World – Create characters, gather resources, explore diverse worlds, and level up your abilities. Your journey to forge legends begins now!

I always recommend my mentees to join these events at least once a year, independent of their current situation.

In this last hackathon I met this guy who joins Hackathons as a hobby (wins most of them) and he even goes with his daughter. Really inspiring !

Also met other founders that were there as Mentors like Adam Spiers who created this free private onchain address book and previously Panther Protocol, Damian Rusinek who created Composable_sec – Smart Contracts Security Audit, Madalina who works at Vega Protocol and many others !

If you are a hacker, you probably code as a hobby like me ❤️

  • Get that direct access to new ideas and innovation by experimenting with new technologies and building prototypes
  • Expand professional network and discover career opportunities
  • Learn new technical skills like programming languages and tools
  • Achieve recognition and awards for innovative solutions (Always good to get some credibility)
  • Feel a sense of accomplishment by completing a challenging project within a short timeframe (Real dopamine here)

Now for the companies that are sponsoring or just visiting the hackathons 🏢

  • You can brainstorm and get new ideas for products, services, or solutions by tapping into hackers’ creativity
  • Foster innovation and problem-solving and bring it to your company
  • Promote cross-functional collaboration and knowledge-sharing
  • Save time with the recruiting as you will have direct insight about the developers performance, commitment and soft skills without those long and inefficient tests

It is always a win-win, independent of the side you are (Hacker or Mentor). Also, you can expand your network, update yourself, see what others are working on, chance to win a prize and learn something new.

The projects were 🤯 and I was able to help some hackers (Felt useful haha) ! Keep smashing you all building the future !! 🚀

…and check my POAP

Bridging the Gap: Empowering Students with a Tech Career Roadmap

On December 11th, I had the privilege of presenting tech career workshop at Leicester College (One of my best workshops so far ❤️). The workshop aimed to provide students with the necessary guidance and insights to navigate their career paths and secure their first job in the dynamic tech industry.

The highlight of the workshop was obviously 🤣 the prizes where the students had to answer a quiz and compete for some swags. It was heart warming to hear the feedbacks saying the workshop exceeded their expectations, specially the salary roadmap 💰 and that they learned a lot about the industry from a professional.

The gifs got lost 😞 but I am sharing the slides here:

Thanks to Arbaaz, for recognizing the importance of empowering students with the tools to succeed in the tech field and I am thrilled to participate in the upcoming workshop dedicated exclusively to women in tech 👩‍💻 next year.

Brazilian QA’s around the world series – Julio de Lima

Julio de Lima is a Principal QA Engineer with 14 years of experience in software testing. He has worked in all levels of testing. He has implemented functional software testing automation process in 18 companies using tools like Selenium Webdriver and TestComplete also non-functional automation testing using JMeter. He has a Master’s degree in Electrical Engineering and Computing with a focus on AI and some software testing certifications: CTFL, CTFL Agile Tester, CTAL Test Manager, CTAL Test Automation Engineer, CBTS (Brazilian Certification), and SoapUI Pro. Sporadically he also works as a guest post-graduate professor at: CESAR School (Recife and Manaus) and Unicesumar (Paraná). He is also a well-known speaker at Brazilian conferences such as iMasters PHP Experience, The Developers Conference, BRATESTE, É dia de Java, PHPConference, TICNOVA, TestTalk, GURU-SP, ScrumDay Brazil, Jornada Colaborativa, and also two International conferences: STAREast 2020, Selenium Day North America, and QA Global Summit.

Be sure to follow Julio on LinkedIn.

TL;DR;
Julio de Lima immigrated to the USA for better quality of life and bilingual opportunities for daughter. Pursued career growth, adapting to cultural shifts. He noted flexibility in work schedule and emphasis on delivery over seniority in the US workplace. Julio adapted QA practices from holistic to specialized approach. Embraced QA’s established importance in the US compared to Brazil. Learned to identify business opportunities through software quality. Brazilian lessons of dedication and positivity proved valuable. Noticed differences in lunch culture and work-life balance, with more relaxed hours in the US.

What were your reasons for choosing to immigrate to the USA? How did you prepare for finding a job and planning your move?

I would say that the main reasons were the possibility of having a better quality of life and also the possibility of giving my daughter the possibility of growing up fluent in a second language. The climate in the region where we live is similar to Brazil, which is our country of origin, and that made all the difference in the choice.

I saw in the company I currently work at, the opportunity to one day live and work in the United States of America 🇺🇸, so the path I planned and followed involved establishing myself as a consultant who delivers with quality, is reliable and who manages to work in multicultural teams. I needed to build this reputation so that I could one day achieve my goal, that’s how I got the international company transference 🙌

What are some of the cultural differences you’ve encountered in the new workplace ? 

The biggest difference I notice is related to the flexibility of the schedule when I have really satisfactory deliveries. In my home country, it is part of the culture for a senior manager to work late to demonstrate commitment. In my current context, regardless of your seniority, the commitment is with your delivery. I can’t say that this is a common factor in all organizations in the US, but it is definitely something that I found in the company where I work and that contributes a lot to my quality of life.

Are there any specific challenges you faced when adapting to the QA practices and standards in the USA ? How did you overcome them? 

Yes, there is. In Brazil 🇧🇷 I always had a more holistic position as a QA Engineer, but in the US what I found was a more segmented culture. A good example is the fact that in many of the clients I worked with, non-functional tests are performed by specialized companies instead of having the QA Engineer as the influencer and facilitator of such practices. Therefore, my first test strategy, which involved such practices, sounded strange when I said that I, QA Engineer, would be responsible for organizing the way in which these tests would be carried out.

My way of overcoming differences has been to adapt, learn the common format of the country or organizations, become an expert on the subject, earn the respect of clients and then propose changes that can really optimize the way we work in tests and quality of software. This positioning helps not to sound like just someone disgruntled or parochial, but rather, a real connoisseur of the pros and cons of whatever approach is used.

Have you noticed any variations in the perception or importance placed on quality assurance compared to Brazil? If so, in what ways? 

Yes, I noticed that here in the US the role of the test and software quality analyst has been considered important for years. I mean, there’s no need to convince leaders that software testing is important, they already know. Compared to Brazil, this is definitely a great advance, after all, there are still many companies that do not formally have software testing and quality professionals due to the simple fact that the leaders “do not understand the benefit” 😬.

Are there any new unique methodologies or tools that you’ve come across that have improved your QA processes? 

Not exactly. What I learned here so far was more related to how to identify business opportunities through software quality, that is, thinking about the issue of the positive impact on costs, effort and time through changes or implementation of certain approaches to testing and software quality. This has taught me to look at my work as something even more valuable than I thought 💪, that is, using testing and software quality as something to reduce the organization’s expenses or even increase its profit.

Are there any specific lessons or skills you learned in Brazil that you find particularly valuable in the USA ?

In Brazil I learned to find a way to solve what was assigned to me, no matter how difficult or complex it is. This made me have a more dedicated profile to deliver with great dedication. Another point was the desire to bring a positive and lively vibe to the work environment. I feel that both helped me a lot from the first moment here. The people I worked with gave me great feedback, when they liked working with me for being a high-spirited vibe and quality deliveries.

Have you noticed any differences in the work-life balance or professional expectations ?

In Brazil we have a predefined lunch schedule by law and culturally we even have a time range in which we commonly have lunch. Companies kind of force us to do this, fearing lawsuits related to this at the end of the employment contract. Upon arriving in the USA, I realized that lunch time is not something like in Brazil, I mean, many of my colleagues go down, buy snacks and eat at their tables, something that is not common in Brazil, where we usually go out to have lunch with co-workers at restaurants in the area. It’s like a daily celebration 🙌. Even in remote work, there is a time to disconnect from work and have lunch, rest or even solve personal problems. However, this is not common around here and meetings are scheduled right at the time that in Brazil it was kind of a sin to schedule meetings. It shocked me a little at first, but nowadays I’ve managed to adapt and deal with it more naturally.

Talking about the amount of time at work, I would say that here it has been much better than in Brazil, as I said earlier, there is not that pressure that the more senior you are, the later you have to finish your day at work. This is a fantastic thing.

Thanks Julio !! Amazing person to follow in QA ! Not many people know, but I once was also a student of Julio, back in the days I was learning calabash and ruby for mobile automation 😂

And with sadness, but also thrilled to have the collaboration of so many BIG names in QA not only in Brazil, but now internationally as well this was the last post of this series ! Thanks to everyone who participated and helped with this project ! Amazing to share and learn from your journeys outside our home country 🇧🇷 ❤️

Brazilian QA’s around the world series – Ana Paula Vale

Ana Paula Vale has been working with Technology for almost 9 years. Right now she is a Frontend Engineer and this became her career development goal after she shifted from QA Engineer.

Working with development has always been part of her life even as a person in the Software Testing area, as she was already applying test automation in every company she has been through, as she has always been passionate about it and saw the value in having automated applications.

Be sure to follow Ana on LinkedIn.


TL;DR;

Ana Paula immigrated to Portugal for new personal and professional experiences. She researched companies, job requirements, and living costs in various countries. Language was a challenge in adapting to QA practices, but she improved communication by clarifying perspectives and proposing ideas. She introduced BDD and automation concepts to Portugal. Quality importance seems consistent between Brazil and Portugal. Ana learned about visual testing and brought an automation mindset from Brazil. Work-life balance improved in Portugal with flexible hours and better quality of life. She transitioned from QA to a Frontend Developer role and noticed better recognition for developers.

What were your reasons for choosing to immigrate to Portugal ? How did you
prepare for finding a job and planning your move?

I didn’t have a great reason. At first, I wanted to leave Brazil to have new personal and
professional experiences. I started by trying Australia, New Zealand, Canada. I also tried
the company you, Rafa, were working for, remember? Haha 😂
But it turned out that I had a friend living in Portugal who referred me to the company
where he was working for.
I researched which companies were in those countries, what they asked for vacancies,
the cost of living in the cities, and what the culture was like. I also improved my resume,
sent cover letters to the companies that required it, and made connections via Linkedin
to get more ideas and tips.

Are there any specific challenges you faced when adapting to the QA practices and standards in Portugal ? How did you overcome them?

Yes, first the language. Even though we speak Portuguese, it wasn’t easy for us to
communicate in meetings and several misunderstandings happened. In these moments,
I tried to clarify my perspective, listen more, and ask questions. Also, give quick
feedback.
I was used to working with BDD, with an agile testing mindset, and always participating
in the product solution process, for example. But when I arrived, I realized that most of
the tests were manual, and I needed to be patient to understand their side, involve
myself more in the processes, propose my ideas and show them that we could try to
start automating things and why it could be better for us. I really believed in the power of
working with Behavior Driven Development and also did some workshops for them, for
example.

Have you noticed any variations in the perception or importance placed on quality assurance compared to Brazil? If so, in what ways?

No, as far as I remember, the importance given to quality was the same.

Are there any new unique methodologies or tools that you’ve come across that have improved your QA processes?

Yes, I learned more about visual tests and how to automate them. In Brazil, I thought I
only needed a tool like Applitools to do this, for example. And then I learned that visual
testing was more about image comparison and that we could also introduce visual tests
into our pipeline in a cheaper way, I would say.

Photo by Gratisography on Pexels.com

Are there any specific lessons or skills you learned in Brazil that you find particularly valuable in Portugal ?

Yes, I feel that in Brazil we focus a lot more on test automation and on the idea that
testing is not a phase, but an activity. I learned in Brazil that we are all responsible for
the quality of software and I brought that back here, when I started teaching the
developers from my team to automate, to think about test scenarios and how we could
start to avoid bugs, for example.

Have you noticed any differences in the work-life balance or professional
expectations ?

So, it depends. But I would say yes because I feel that I am very passionate about what I
do and that this can cause an increase in the load I give to work haha because I really
like to work. But now, after having migrated (yes, I now work as a Frontend Developer), I
feel my life is simpler. Unfortunately, I noticed that I’m more listened to now as a
developer than before as a QA. It was much harder to explain why testing is important,
for example.
Talking about work-life, I would say it’s better, of course. All the companies I worked for
offered flexible working hours, alternating vacation days, that is, you didn’t have to take a
whole month of vacation, for example. In addition, the cost of living is low and the quality
of life is better. So going out at night is safer and cheaper. 😂

Thanks for sharing your experience Aninha 🙏 😊 I know closely how you built your path to become what you wanted !

Brazilian QA’s around the world series – Vinicius Pessoni

Solutions-oriented and highly adaptable Pessoni has 13+ years’ experience leading and shipping high availability software for high-growth organisations. ISTQB CTFL Certified Tester. Proficient in Linux, JAVA, Kotlin, Ruby, GoLang, Test Techniques (manual and automated), SQL, Software Development Processes and more. Awarded University Professor. Find him on channels @pessonizando

Be sure to follow Pessoni on LinkedIn.

TL;DR;
In this interview, Pessoni discusses his reasons for immigrating to the UK and how he prepared for the move. He shares cultural differences he encountered in the workplace, such as dress code nuances, and the challenges he faced while adapting to QA practices, including learning a new programming language and embracing agile methods. Pessoni highlights the growing value of quality assurance professionals in both the UK and Brazil, with the UK offering more opportunities in the QA space. He also mentions the benefits of using BDD and issue managers like Jira in QA processes. Additionally, Pessoni emphasizes the importance of creativity and resilience learned in Brazil, which are highly valued skills in the UK. Lastly, he appreciates the UK’s emphasis on work-life balance, contrasting it with past experiences of working long hours in Brazil.

What were your reasons for choosing to immigrate to the UK? How did you prepare for finding a job and planning your move?

I was always curious about other cultures and countries, since I was a kid. While growing up, even though I didn’t have the chance to visit other countries, I would watch documentaries and read about them and their history. That would fascinate me! At some point in my life, my parents then moved to the UK due to a financial crisis we were going through so they could try a new start in a new country that would give them more possibilities than Brazil. After that the dream to live in another country grew more and more in me but I took several years to have the courage to move into the UK. So, after several years after my parents living in the UK I finally had the courage to leave my career as a University lecturer in Brazil and moved into the UK.

Regarding preparing for moving, I spent a year studying more English, doing TOEFL and IELTS and applying for jobs. TOEFL and IELTS were not used back then to apply for jobs but I was studying for them because I wanted to do a PHD in the UK. I ended up not doing it but studying for these english tests were really helpful for me to improve my english level. 

So when I was looking for a job, I applied for multiple roles until I got an offer! In this way, I only had courage to quit my successful lecturer career and come to the UK 🇬🇧 because I had already secured a job.

Its always nice to have some money set aside also to help you with the move. You will have to think about where you are going to live, save money for deposit and other needs. Some companies will give you help on that. Mine didn’t. But I was fortunate to have my parents living here, so I stayed with them until I found A place for me to live.  

What are some of the cultural differences you’ve encountered in the new workplace ? 

I experienced different cultural nuances in different companies that I’ve been in since I moved to the UK. I remember that in the first company I worked, one of the funny things but that it was a super surprising one was about the dress code. Even though the company wasn’t formal, there were some things you just couldn’t wear in an office. For instance, once I showed up in sweatpants to the office. However for me, being a Brazilian and since the office didn’t have a formal dress code, I thought was not a big deal. But then, after some days, one of my office friends told me that I couldn’t wear that in the office. I was surprised how long it took for some of them to tell me that. Even my manager didn’t tell me that right away. I would expect them to tell me as soon as possible so I wouldn’t repeat the funny incident. But they waited several days and multiple times to tell me about that. So, it’s nice that people are super polite in the UK. However, that can sometimes cause some funny situations like this one.

Are there any specific challenges you faced when adapting to the QA practices and standards in the UK ? How did you overcome them? 

When I came, my automation skills were not great and I was accepted to work in a different language that I had experience. I had a lot of experience with Java and also used to teach in the universities. However, my first job in the UK was using Ruby as a programming language. So, it took me some months to learn the language and to become more productive. One of the other practices that I was really working on in my first job here (very differently from Brazil) was the agile methods. The company I joined was very mature in scrum method and it was super nice to learn it really in real life. Even though I used to teach agile methods in Brazil, I have not experienced companies there doing agile in the very smart way as in here. 

Have you noticed any variations in the perception or importance placed on quality assurance compared to Brazil? If so, in what ways? 

I believe Brazil is still in a journey regarding valuing quality assurance, testers, professionals. In here I can see that the quality assurance professionals are valued and have good salaries. I could also see that changing for the better in Brazil in the last 5 years. 

The UK has generally more opportunities that Brazil in the QA space. 

Are there any new unique methodologies or tools that you’ve come across that have improved your QA processes? 

One of my favourite ones and most controversial I would say its BDD. Using behaviour driven development in a day to day to develop software really helps to have more clarity, stir better conversations and also to produce better products. I would also say that having good issue managers like jira really helps in productivity and day to day organization.

Are there any specific lessons or skills you learned in Brazil that you find particularly valuable in the UK ?

Two of the things I think its very valuable for our careers not only in Brazil but that is super valued here is our creativity and resilience. As Brazilians, we are used to deal with unexpected situations and hardships. That develops in us the ability to handle difficult problems, challenges and also to be creative while solving them.

Have you noticed any differences in the work-life balance or professional expectations ?

Definitely! And that’s one of my greatest learnings from living in the UK. I love how this culture values work-life balance. I have learned much more here. There were times in Brazil where I would be working 12 hours a day in 2 different jobs, like crazy. Since I moved in here I can have a way better quality of life in general.

Thanks a lot Pessoni, even tho I also moved from Brazil 🇧🇷 to UK 🇬🇧, we had loads of different experiences and this summarises the reasons why it is always good to learn from others !

Brazilian QA’s around the world series – Frederico Moreira

Frederico Moreira has over 15 years of experience working with quality in its many levels and expert in Test Automation. He is proficient in Agile environments with experience in testing in a microservices architecture. Proficient in Linux environment with good scripting knowledge and proficient in testing in different platforms (e.g. mobile, web and APIs).

Be sure to follow Frederico on LinkedIn.

TL; DR;

In this interview, Frederico Moreira shares his journey of immigrating to Portugal and the cultural differences he encountered in the workplace. He discusses the challenges faced while adapting to QA practices in Portugal, noting that the role of QA is more evolved in Brazil. Despite the resistance to change in Portugal, Frederico emphasizes the importance of resilience in driving improvements in engineering culture. He also observes variations in the perception and importance placed on quality assurance, with Brazil showing more focus on non-functional quality attributes. While he didn’t find unique methodologies or tools that significantly impacted his QA processes in Portugal, he embraced learning and implementing new test automation frameworks like Cypress and Playwright. Frederico values the resilience he learned in Brazil, which proved essential in navigating cultural differences and proposing changes in Portugal. Recently, he transitioned from a QA career to a Tech Lead role, finding new challenges and opportunities for growth.

What were your reasons for choosing to immigrate to Portugal? How did you prepare for finding a job and planning your move?


I’ll try to summarize the story because it’s long 😅. At the beginning of 2016, I decided to leave my hometown and live in São Paulo, Brazil’s main “technological city.” I accepted a job offer for a new challenge in my career in a big company there.

However, after three months on this new journey, I received an invitation from a company in Portugal to do the interview process. It is worth mentioning that I always wanted to have an international experience. I was approved and received a job offer, but I couldn’t embrace this opportunity for a few reasons.

So in 2018, the same company contacted me, and this time, everything went well 🙂 So I would say that I was chosen to immigrate to Portugal and not vice versa.

Details of the entire journey here: https://www.farfetchtechblog.com/en/blog/post/joining-farfetch-a-guide-for-candidates-moving-between-countries/

Even in this blog post, I tell you how my planning went and all the excellent support I received to plan my move.

What are some of the cultural differences you’ve encountered in the new workplace? 

Generalizing the first cultural difference that I found most striking for me was seeing people prioritize family and quality of life more than the ambition to evolve their own careers . In my opinion, people are less “workaholics” than people in the IT market in Brazil.

On the other hand, I’m not sure if this is directly related, but I found a much greater resistance to change here. In several situations, I heard things like: “It’s working. You don’t need to change it. Keep it that way.” and “In a winning team, you don’t change.”

Are there any specific challenges you faced when adapting to the QA practices and standards in Portugal? How did you overcome them? 

First of all, the role of QA, in general, is much more evolved in Brazil, at least in the companies I had the opportunity to work for. Some topics that the QA community started to discuss back in 2010, for example, manual QA vs. automator QA but also the role of a QA in an agile team, is still a paradigm shift in almost every company I worked for here in Portugal, even companies that were not from Portugal I found this scenario.

To overcome this, in my first few months, I participated in a few local software development communities in my city, Porto. But I also created internal training for QAs, Tech Leads, Developers and etc., to try to change people’s mindsets and deliver some value in the engineering culture of companies. But I confess that it wasn’t easy, and it isn’t. It’s a slow process that requires a lot of resilience.

Have you noticed any variations in the perception or importance placed on quality assurance compared to Brazil? If so, in what ways? 

Yes, when I left Brazil in 2018, it was not so common for companies to find continuous delivery pipelines with performance and security tests. At least, that was my perception at the time. But I had the opportunity to explore more non-functional quality attributes in the companies I worked for.

But getting here, I realized that the focus was and it is still more focused on functional tests, whether manual or automated, than on tests and non-functional quality attributes such as security, performance, resilience, and so on.

This could even be a common gap in the world, not just in specific continents, but even today, in Brazil, these topics are still more talked about and promoted.

Are there any new unique methodologies or tools that you’ve come across that have improved your QA processes?

Honestly, no, I don’t know if it was the engineering culture, maturity of the people on the teams, or something else, but I confess that there was nothing I found here that made me think, “WOW,” this is going to change my life or even how did I not know this before.

On the other hand, I was able to learn and use, on a large scale, new test automation frameworks for the Web, such as Cypress and Playwright, which have emerged in recent years or gained more notoriety in the market. Still on framework, in the mobile contexts, I worked with, I had the opportunity to evolve testing strategies for hybrid mobile apps built with React Native, not that I like it that much 🙂 but it was and still is an interesting experience.

Are there any specific lessons or skills you learned in Brazil that you find particularly valuable in Portugal?

If I were to choose one, it would definitely be RESILIENCE 💪.

As I said earlier, there is greater resistance to change than in Brazil, and to overcome this, you need to be resilient and patient, set your expectations, and convince people clearly and transparently of the value your proposed changes can bring.

But this is part of your professional growth when you emerge in a new culture, it will undoubtedly contribute to your maturity as well. After all, if everything were the same, if people didn’t have divergent/conflicting opinions, our career wouldn’t be as challenging as it is in the software development world.

Why did you recently switch careers and leave the QA career?

For many years in my QA career, I worked in positions ranging from intern to Manager. I had the opportunity to work in the QA role, from companies with startup profiles to enterprise companies with thousands of people in software development.

Tiredness has arrived. I had a sequence of three companies I worked for where I had to help create the QA area almost from scratch and educate people and teams about software quality, and this mission was not always easy.

Because I’ve always been a more technical QA, I always liked being close to the code but also to robust pipelines 👨‍💻. This opened me to opportunities in different contexts to act as an interim Tech Lead for some teams. These experiences were the main trigger for the career change, I discovered new ways to continue in constant evolution, but with another perspective and with a vast new world of challenges.

So far, it has been challenging, and I have not regretted changing careers.

Thanks for taking the time to contribute Frederico 🙌 Your expertise and the unique experience to also change career in another country was extremely valuable to this Brazilian QA’s around the world series 🤘

Brazilian QA’s around the world series – Elias Nogueira

Elias Nogueira helps Software Engineers (Backend, Frontend, and QA) to develop their quality mindset and deliver high-quality software. Quality for him is it: mindset here we must develop and create approaches from the requirements definition to the post-delivery.

He loves sharing knowledge in different ways, so everything he knows he teaches others. He grew up in his career sharing knowledge with my colleagues, and he believes everyone should do the same.
He has a page with all his presentations and community activities at https://github.com/eliasnogueira/public-speaking

His specialties include quickly learning new skills and programming languages, problem-solving, testing architecture, quality engineering, and shift left testing. He also loves to write code on the backend side.

Be sure to follow Elias on LinkedIn.

TL;DR;

In this interview, Elias shares his experience of immigrating to the Netherlands and adapting to the QA practices there. He discusses cultural differences in the workplace, emphasizing the importance of respect and learning to work together despite diverse backgrounds. Elias highlights the value of putting “quality” as a priority in companies, regardless of their size or type. He mentions using methodologies like “The Five Whys” and “Proof of Concept” to address problems and make decisions based on context rather than following trends. Elias also praises the soft skills learned in Brazil, such as effective communication and understanding different perspectives, which are highly valued in the Netherlands. Elias remarks on the significant difference in work-life balance, where the Dutch prioritize personal time and direct, straightforward feedback in the professional environment. Overall, Elias’s journey demonstrates the growth and adaptability that come with pursuing opportunities in a different country.

What were your reasons for choosing to immigrate to the Netherlands? How did you prepare for finding a job and planning your move?

To be honest, the Netherlands 🇳🇱 has chosen me 🙂
I was looking for a challenge in the USA, and for that, I did a preparation joining some interviews to get experience in it, plus knowing which type of candidate they were looking for.

During this process I was at an event, The Developers Conference, where companies from Canada and Netherlands were trying to hire people. Surprisingly there were a few Brazilians in one of the companies’ booths, I talked to them and already started the process. It was in the TDC 2019 in Florianópolis, Brazil.

What are some of the cultural differences you’ve encountered in the new workplace ? 

The first one, which is classic, is trying to understand different English accents in my workplace, as the company has people from more than 30 countries working there.

The second was to understand that everyone, sometimes, behaves in a certain way based on the country they’ve lived in or their beliefs. The main thing was to learn how to respect, live and work together with these differences.

Photo by fauxels on Pexels.com

Are there any specific challenges you faced when adapting to the QA practices and standards in the Netherlands? How did you overcome them? 

I tell everyone I was blessed to start working in a company that puts Quality in the first place. All people I’ve worked with are extremely technical (yes, including the Quality Engineers) and it was easy to follow.

My biggest challenge compared to the previous company to the current one is the decision-making process: in the previous, there were more efforts to train people in the technical changes, adoption, or practices. In the current one, the effort is more on explaining technically which solution is the best, its benefits, and possible risks as everyone has the technical knowledge level.

Have you noticed any variations in the perception or importance placed on quality assurance compared to Brazil? If so, in what ways? 

I really think that is basically one main item in this equation: how the company sees “quality”. Does not matter if the company is a startup or a big tech. When I was a consultant I saw both types of companies not looking into any quality perspective.
My observation is that it’s more in the leadership (technical leaders and C level) than the type of business.

But what I can say is that Brazilians know a lot and are hard workers. We are always willing to learn and it makes us one of the best software engineers in the world.

Are there any new unique methodologies or tools that you’ve come across that have improved your QA processes? 

I’ve experienced the application of a lot of Agile Methodologies in my career, and I have two approaches, not methodologies, that are helping me a lot to understand the problems and shaping processes:

  • The Five Whys, where helps me to understand any kind of problem, its causes and effects, and the possible solutions. It helps me in any situation: understanding a general problem, technical issue, process improvements, adoption of new possible tools, etc…
  • PoC – Proof of Concept: as all the work is done is basically technical we must be able to prove that a new methodology, approach, tool, or change, can adapt to the current context. For that, I use the PoC all the time with different options to guide people in the right direction.

Any new methodology comes and goes, and for me, the most important thing is to shape a process with something that makes sense based on the context rather than following any trending one.

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

Are there any specific lessons or skills you learned in Brazil that you find particularly valuable in the Netherlands?

We, Brazilians, tend to talk a lot, and with it comes the soft skill to understand different opinions and talk to different people to get things done. This is one of the most desired soft-skill for software engineers in Europe.

People who do not communicate in different ways and levels tend to grow more slowly than others, and it makes sense because when you do this you also learn a lot.
Here they appreciate that we try to understand the different opinions and base the recommendations or ideas based on that.

Have you noticed any differences in the work-life balance or professional expectations ?

Yes! The most impacted cultural difference for me!
First things first: unfortunately I’m comparing a 3rd world country (Brazil), with a lot of issues from a different perspective, to a 1st world country that has their issues, but easy compared to the ones we have in Brazil.

In Brazil we are workaholics, and we do this because we need to work hard to get better jobs, salary increases, and learn as fast as we can based on the context we lived.
In the Netherlands, they really separate work and life, as you spend only the necessary and agreed time working, and then you enjoy your life. There’s no after-hours work.
Is there a critical issue to solve and it’s 5 pm? No worries, you can fix it tomorrow. The most important thing here is to keep this work-life balance perfect to not stress you out.

Now, they always have professional expectations about what you were hired for, and they will be direct to you when it’s not good, as well they will appreciate the good job you are doing. I personally believe it’s fair because, in Brazil, we need to tell a whole story and walk on eggshells before giving feedback. Here, in the Netherlands, the people will give you feedback straightforwardly.

I completely agree about the culture differences, thanks Elias for sharing this !! Actually, I have experienced some of this myself ! In Brazil if you are sick you go to work anyway, workaholic culture, BAU. Here in UK you have a better quality of life, if you are sick don’t go to work and specially don’t spread to others your diseases. Everybody says straight away: Jeez christ you are gross, at least work from home for god’s sake 😂

Brazilian QA’s around the world series – Alekson Fortes

Alekson Fortes is a software developer with over 10 years of experience in IT and I have a strong technical background mostly as a QA expert. He has been working with Agile (Scrum, Kanban, XP, Lean) since 2017, and has experience in test automation, DevOps, cloud, CICD, pipelines, and testing strategy. Also, He can help teams to adopt TDD/BDD/ATDD, acting in the levels of Unit Tests, Component Tests, Integration Tests, and E2E Tests.

Be sure to follow Alekson on LinkedIn.


TL;DR;

Alekson Fortes shares his experience immigrating to Canada, finding a job, and adapting to the QA practices. Cultural differences included language barriers and a different work-life balance. Challenges were overcome through learning and gaining confidence. The perception of QA varied, with some companies viewing it as a basic entry-level job. Unique methodologies like ATDD and exposure to AWS improved QA processes. Soft skills learned in Brazil were valuable for facing challenges abroad. Work-life balance in Canada prioritizes personal time and offers generous vacation and sick days.

What were your reasons for choosing to immigrate to Canada? How did you prepare for finding a job and planning your move?

Canada chose me! I was at The Developer’s Conference in Brazil as a speaker and the recruiters of my first company were there, so I talked to them and after 10 days and 3 interviews I had a job offer. I thought I was not ready to find a job abroad but the destiny thought I was. I was preparing myself on that time by studying JavaScript and Protractor.

What are some of the cultural differences you’ve encountered in the new workplace ?

Language barrier, hard to express myself as I do in Portuguese. Also, people in Canada work less than in Brazil and I had to learn to step on the break when I just arrived. Wanted to work after 5pm and some people told me to stop and go home.

Are there any specific challenges you faced when adapting to the QA practices and standards in Canada? How did you overcome them?

I had a huge imposter syndrome, so I imagined the QA practices here would be more advanced than the ones we have in Brazil. It took me some months to realize things here were not advanced as it was in some places I have worked in Brazil. Of course I also had some practices that were better here, example: working together with developers. At my first company I started to pair with devs everyday and after 1 year I was able to perform dev and ops tasks. I overcame my syndrome after I lost my first time regarding the pandemics and I got 4 new job offers in 10 days after being laid off. This showed me that I was not only lucky to get a job in Canada, but I was also qualified for it.

Have you noticed any variations in the perception or importance placed on quality assurance compared to Brazil? If so, in what ways?

I noticed that some companies still think QA is the last step of SDLC. This has a big influence from the Games industry which is strong in Montreal. Since it is hard to automate tests for a game, usually companies hire testers who will play the games to find bugs and QA is perceived as an entry level job. Some people have no idea what a QA engineer is because of this. They think QA is only someone who repeats manual tests. Again, we also have mature companies where QA is really advanced and updated to the best practices, but the gaming culture was a big surprise compared to my experience in Brazil.

Photo by Andrea Piacquadio on Pexels.com

Are there any new unique methodologies or tools that you’ve come across that have improved your QA processes?

I learned ATDD by reading the agile testing book here. It is something I could have learned in Brazil, but I did here and I applied with success in Canada. Also I was exposed to an AWS environment where I learned a lot of DevOps and cloud. It helped me a lot to get the 4 job offers later in my life here.

Are there any specific lessons or skills you learned in Brazil that you find particularly valuable in Canada?

I invested strongly in Soft Skills and it helped me to have Emotional Intelligence to be able to face my challenges here. People think life abroad is easy, but it is the opposite. Especially when you come alone. The soft skills I learned that most helped me were NLP(Neuro Linguistic Programming) and Toastmasters skills. All available in Brazil.

Have you noticed any differences in the work-life balance or professional expectations ?

A huge difference. People really care to have a work-life balance and they rarely do extra hours or work during weekends. We also have a lot of vacation, holidays and sick days. Some companies in Montreal like Ubisoft are allowing people to take 6 weeks of vacation. I have worked in a place where I used to work only 4 days per week, 32 hours.

Alekson’s journey as a QA professional in Canada has been one of growth and adaptation. Thanks again Alekson for sharing your experience and insights 😊

Brazilian QA’s around the world series – Walmyr Lima

Walmyr Lima is software engineer who loves testing. He is also a clean coder, blogger, YouTuber,

online instructor, mentor, speaker, an active member of the testing automation and JavaScript communities, and a fan of good music, tattoos, vegan food, and skateboarding.

Be sure to follow Walmyr on LinkedIn.

TL;DR;

Walmyr Lima’s decision to immigrate to Spain was sparked by their ability to understand and read Spanish content. They found a job opportunity at Typeform in Barcelona and relocated with the company’s assistance. Cultural differences were noticed, with Spanish people being warmer and the language being a significant change. Adapting to QA practices in Spain was not challenging for Walmyr as they had previous experience in a similar role. The perception and importance of quality assurance varied between companies rather than being country-specific. Walmyr discovered new methodologies and tools in their role as a Quality Assistant. Professionalism was deemed valuable regardless of the country. Work-life balance was generally seen as better in Europe compared to Brazil.

What were your reasons for choosing to immigrate to Spain? How did you prepare for finding a job and planning your move?

It was almost accidentally. My wife and I were actually planning moving to London, when one day, while preparing for a Live Stream on YouTube, I read a content in Spanish, which was related to the content I was going to present. I was able to read and understand everything, which made me think we (my wife and I) could live in Spain.

Then I searched for the coolest startups to work in Barcelona, since we would like to live close to the sea, and then I found Typeform. I applied for the job, went through the whole interview process, and got an offer (with relocation help and everything else). The rest is history.

What are some of the cultural differences you’ve encountered in the new workplace ? 

As a person who had been living in Europe for 6 years before moving to Spain, the main difference was cultural, since before that, I had lived in Norway and The Netherlands 😯. The Spanish people are more similar to Brazilians. They’re “warmer” ❤️. The language was a big difference too, and one of the main reasons for the move. In terms of workplace, nothing changed much, since I came to work remotely, which is something I was already used to before the move.

Are there any specific challenges you faced when adapting to the QA practices and standards in Spain? How did you overcome them? 

No really. I was hired to work as a Software Engineer Quality Assistant, which is something I was already used to do, but never had the exact title.

Have you noticed any variations in the perception or importance placed on quality assurance compared to Brazil? If so, in what ways? 

I think every country has companies that practice software engineering with excellence while others don’t care about it. That said, I don’t think the differences are related to the country you are in, but the company you choose to work for.

Are there any new unique methodologies or tools that you’ve come across that have improved your QA processes? 

Well, maybe yes. I mean, it was the first time I was hired as Quality Assistant, but the company was still discovering what such a role really meant.

We (the Quality Assistance team) were there to help teams become autonomous in terms of everything quality-related. We were helping them with their quality bottlenecsk, but for a short periods of time. After that, they should be able to “walk with the own legs”. We were also helping them with tooling (testing frameworks, visual regression testing, testing management systems, etc). Finally, we were helping the company to reduce cost, replacing paid SaaS for open-source alternatives.

Are there any specific lessons or skills you learned in Brazil that you find particularly valuable in Spain?

Again, I don’t think it’s a country thing. In my opinion, it’s all about professionalism. If you are a professional, we’re it independent of where you live.

Have you noticed any differences in the work-life balance or professional expectations ?

Yes, not only in Spain, but in Europe in general. My impression is that europeans care more about a good work-life balance than Brazilians, but it’s probably because they had more time to develop, their currencies are (usually) more valued than Brazilian Reais, and their economies have (in general) less inflation.

Thanks Walmyr for sharing your adventures around Europe, great insights and experiences 🚀

Brazilian QA’s around the world series – Renata Andrade

Renata Andrade is a software quality champion. She helps teams build the best strategy to practice quality in the easiest, fastest and most reliable way possible, adding more value to the business.

Driven by excellence, innovation and creativity, Renata loves making a difference, learning, sharing knowledge, and inspiring people. She likes working in a high tech environment with difficult challenges to solve. Renata also love attending conferences, reading books, writing blog posts, and giving talks about diverse topics in this area.

Be sure to follow Renata on LinkedIn.

TL;DR;

Renata Andrade chose to immigrate to the USA after falling in love with San Francisco during a visit. She saved money, studied English in New Zealand, and eventually got a job at a consulting company in San Francisco. In 2018, she applied for and obtained an H1B visa sponsored by the company. She highlights the respectful atmosphere and the vibrant tech scene in Silicon Valley as reasons for choosing to live there. She also discuss cultural differences in work relations and the fast-paced nature of companies in Silicon Valley. Renata Andrade shares advice for those looking to relocate and emphasises the importance of understanding the cultural differences beforehand. She notes that the perception and importance placed on quality assurance in the USA can vary, but generally, Brazilian QAs are more prepared. She mentions tools and practices like git, code reviews, and Devops that have improved their QA processes. She also highlights the value of a solid software engineering foundation and the lessons learned in Brazil. The work-life balance in the USA is seen as better, with flexible working hours, summer Fridays, and unlimited paid time off being common. Professional expectations vary but are generally similar.

What were your reasons for choosing to immigrate to the USA? How did you prepare for finding a job and planning your move?

I visited San Francisco in 2014 and got in love with the city. People here are really respectful to each other and I could sense that as soon as I got here. Personally, I like exploring new places and getting to experience new cultures. I didn’t speak any English at that time and I had no idea how the immigration process was. It was the first time I wanted to live somewhere different from my hometown (I’m from Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais and I do love Brazil). So I started to save money and in 2015 I went to New Zealand for 6 months to study English. When I got back to Brazil, I got a job at a consulting company from San Francisco – California.

We’d speak English between ourselves and work for American clients. The company didn’t have any American visa programs back then, but in 2018 it started one, I applied for it and I got selected in the H1B visa lottery sponsored by the company (this is one way to immigrate to the US). They had a whole relocation program and it was pretty smooth to move with their support. I already got here working for one of their clients, they provided accommodation for 3 months and since there were other Brazilians at the company, the general experience was shared between us.

Also I had come to the US, San Francisco itself in 2016 and 2017 through this company and I got really familiar with everything. It was my choice to live in San Francisco specifically since I visited it the first time in 2014; I wouldn’t choose anywhere else. I really admire not only the respect factor that I mentioned at the beginning and it’s also cool to be in Silicon Valley. Everything here is super tech, we see people riding their one wheels or electric scooters, having conversations on their AirPods everywhere (even inside the public transportation) wearing their companies’ t-shirts (like Mozilla, Instagram, Google, Netflix) and backpacks. Not to mention that I live within 10 min distance from so many tech companies such as Meta, Google, IBM, Visa, Playstation, Fanatics, Rakuten, Oracle. I love it! A few weeks ago, I saw a driverless car!!! Yes. A car, driving without a driver!!! That blew my mind and I couldn’t be at a better place for myself.

If I could offer some advice, I’d recommend that people looking to relocate, if possible, visit the place before and get a sense of what the place looks like. Of course each experience is unique, and there are many factors that can impact your relocation such as climate, transportation, food, leisure, culture, etc and it’s good to understand a bit of how these things work so you don’t surprise yourself when you move. Moving to another country sometimes feels like you don’t belong to the new place and neither to the old place. It’s not an easy process – but it’s equally amazing.

What are some of the cultural differences you’ve encountered in the new workplace ? 

We usually have the impression that Americans are workaholics. I don’t see that. They don’t have work regulations as Brazilians do – such as max 40hs per week, 30 days of vacation, increased rate for overtime hours after 10pm or weekends/holidays etc. That doesn’t make them ruleless people. In fact, I notice they are way more straight forward.

Their work relations are real work relations. You are hired, you have your benefits (or not), you can request vacation at any time (depending on the company’s policy), you can quit at any moment, no notice required, no bureaucracy, no questions asked. Here, in Silicon Valley, it is really easy to start a company, they offer a lot of financial incentives and because of that I feel that they think too fast. Their pace and creativity is way different from Brazilians because it’s easier and it’s how they behave, so people are impacted by this “culture” of entrepreneurship. At the same time, they just want to do their jobs. When they are done, they are done. And they move on.

So, to recap, the work relations are simple and straightforward, the main difference for me is the pace that things get done or change – everything is super fast. And I’d say, because there are a lot of immigrants, you do experience a lot of differences depending on the team/company you work with. These differences could be: the way you communicate, the team’s interactions, even the quality of the work.

Outside of the worklife, I can say that the buying power here is very different from Brazil. You can get appliances, clothes, phones, and cars much easier than in Brazil. At some point you realize you have way too many things, and not a lot of space to store them… hahaha 😂

Are there any specific challenges you faced when adapting to the QA practices and standards in the USA ? How did you overcome them? 

I don’t believe there were challenges related to the QA practices themselves, but I did face some challenges in explaining to leaders the importance of the QA related practices. For instance, when I say that we need to improve the testing framework because it’s taking too long to run or to develop a new test, leaders don’t understand it.

I need to be extra product oriented or wait for issues to happen to make them understand the importance of it. Most of the time, I use numbers to exemplify my theories, for example: when I needed to hire more QAs for my team, I gathered the time I was spending with each activity, the time to automate them, and the impacts of not doing them. I usually offer a few options, like: a best case scenario, an “ok” scenario and lastly a “not ideal but acceptable” scenario (more often, just 2 options so they don’t spend too much time making a decision).

Another technique is to use benchmarking; bringing to the table how company A, B or C does something is also helpful, sometimes this is not easy to get this data. I have to be honest here that I haven’t been super successful with these approaches. I had some episodes where issues happened in production, and then, finally they understood what I was trying to say. My guess was that because things here happen too fast and companies tend to follow each other’s examples, companies hire QAs and they don’t really understand why they need them (sometimes they think it’s just to manual test things). But overall the QA practices are pretty similar.

Have you noticed any variations in the perception or importance placed on quality assurance compared to Brazil? If so, in what ways? 

I have mixed opinions about this topic, because the US is really big and it has a lot of companies. My first impression when I started to work for American companies from Brazil, was that most of the tools and technologies were the trending top ones. And we could also guess that since most of the QAs that are writing and speaking about software quality are Americans.

But when you really start working with it, you realize that it’s very diverse. I’ve been working with really high performance teams, really smart people, and with below average teams too. Talking about the quality practices specifically, I see that it’s way behind the development practices in terms of people’s knowledge. I feel that Brazilian QAs are more prepared in general.

Photo by fauxels on Pexels.com

Are there any new unique methodologies or tools that you’ve come across that have improved your QA processes? 

Yes, I got really good at git practices, code reviews, Devops. I think the opportunity to work close to dev teams and fulfil responsibilities that are usually not QAs’ made me grow a lot. Living in the Silicon Valley and having the proximity to tech companies also helped because I see ads everywhere and kind of make me curious about them and at least understand what they do. Going to meetups also is another point, that makes me get to know a lot of tools and practices.And we can definitely find that in Brazil too, but I’d say, because of the pace here, it speeded up the process a lot.

A great example here is Playwright. It was suggested by a developer when we were deciding which tool to use and it ended up becoming the tool we adopted and my very favorite tool. I have worked with many tools such as Selenium, WebdriverIO, TestCafe (which is also really good – it has the best locator strategy in my opinion), but the speed and simplicity of Playwright are really impressive and make things sooo much easier for QAs and Devs!

I liked it so much that I now have some Playwright courses in English and Portuguese!

Are there any specific lessons or skills you learned in Brazil that you find particularly valuable in the USA ?

Brazilians are really hard workers. It’s pretty honorable ❤️. Also, the universities and training are really good in Brazil. So I think building a solid software engineering foundation was pretty valuable. Because that can guarantee that you are employable. The job market can get competitive so that’s great before getting in the US. Not to mention that the solving problems ability scales a lot by having a good foundation.

And also important to share the lessons and skills I “didn’t” learn, which is that non-Americans from certain industries, including IT, can apply for their own green-card (which allows you to stay in the US permanently) independently. This green-card category is called EB2-NIW. Without a green-card, you need to have a visa that it’s linked to a company or school and this expires around 6 years after you arrive in the US (so, you need to return to your country after it expires). The temporary visa has a lot of limitations, so the green-card is a great option in this case. Had I known that before, my life would have been so much easier.

Have you noticed any differences in the work-life balance or professional expectations ?

It’s funny to say, but Americans work less ahahah, compared to Brazil. There is no mandatory “lunch time” so, you can work 8 hours straight and still have lunch and breaks. You are naturally pushed to learn more and deliver during your productive time, but not necessarily work more. Another funny thing is that happy-hours in the US are usually from 2 to 6pm.

So, if you are going to a happy hour, you leave work earlier for that. Since the weather is also pretty different from Brazil, some companies have summer Fridays, and they allow employees to leave earlier during the summer. Another great thing about it is the Unlimited Paid Time. A lot of companies offer that and this means that you can go on vacation for as many days as you want per year and still get paid.

Of course your manager has to approve and if you don’t “deliver your work” you get fired, but if you are doing a good job, it’s pretty useful. There is no ⅓ of your salary for vacations, but you get paid as you were normally working.I had almost 2 months of vacation on my last job 🙌.

Professional expectations vary a lot, depending on the company, team, etc. In general I’d say it’s pretty similar.

And that’s a wrap ! Thanks Renata, if you have any questions, feel free to contact her 🙂