1. What is your position at BPD Zenith?

I mainly work with our Global Infrastructure Team, where we deliver Cloud infrastructure for our MaxiCloud clients. I am also involved in other areas of the company assisting Support, Sales and Product Development as required.

2. What led you to choose this career path?

When I was in year 8, back in the day, I received a scholarship at high school to study advanced BASIC, which is a bit of an oxymoron in English, but sounds fine in its original Spanish. That was the first time I got in touch with computers directly, the first time I had the opportunity to create programs and literally create things, that did stuff, out of thin air. This was the 80’s and computers were a thing from the movies to me, being a kid that loved series’ and movies like Star Trek, Star Wars and Galactica you can imagine how I felt back then.

It ended not so well, I had to quit before the final exam, the scholarship was aimed to year 11 and 12 and I simply did not have the mathematical background required to finish, however, the experience left a mark and I decided to give it another try later once I developed better foundations and it went quite well.

~ Andres loves reading comic books and watching series’ and movies such as Star Wars, Star Trek and Galactica ~

3. Which part of your job do you most enjoy?

I still love developing, creating intangible things that resolve real problems, I love deploying well-built elegant solutions that allow running our system. But if I must pick one, I choose resolving hard problems, those where Google does not help. Do not get me wrong, I do not like the stress that usually comes along with these tasks, but I do love the feeling when you finally resolve it, I find that feeling somehow addictive.

4. What do you like about working at BPD Zenith?

Is hard to describe, I think I feel free. I do not take for granted the opportunity to do and learn all sort of things, I have been around for a long time and I know that in most jobs you are restricted in the tasks you will be assigned and the tools you are able to use. Here, there is plenty of opportunity to do what you like to do and not only the things that you must do. And on top of things, our people are great, everybody works hard in our different areas and I know we really care, after years in this industry. I know how valuable that is.

5. What are the values that drive you?

Honesty at the top. I consider myself honest and I hope people see me as honest too. I always try to do the right thing, try to earn my peer’s respect by working hard and being ethical. Of course I have passion, I try to be efficient and I want people to feel like they can count on me when they need me, but honesty is a framework for everything you do and if you are honest, the other pieces fall in place with little effort and all other values are easier to uphold.

6. What do you enjoy doing when you are not working?

The list is long. Spend time with my wife and kids, binge TV shows, play board games, listen to my vinyl records and CDs, read my books and comics, play video games and watch and play soccer.

~ Andres with his family ~

~ Andres’ collection of vinyl records ~

7. If you were not a Maximo consultant, what alternative career path would you have chosen and why?

If I were not in IT at all, I would probably be a good handyman or a carpenter or a sparky. I am always fixing all I can around the house, and I love it.

8. What’s a work-related accomplishment that you’re really proud of?

I am proud about all I do. However, there is one outstanding achievement. Years ago, before leaving Uruguay, I had the opportunity to re-design a whole system from scratch. That is a rare opportunity, for the first time I had the chance to imagine the whole thing, all screens, all integrations with sub-systems, the methodology for it to grow in the future and much more. To the point that I was able to write the user’s guide before even starting the product development. You can only imagine my satisfaction after months and months of work of the development team when I finally saw the system deployed and working in the real world.

9. What’s your favorite way to unwind after a busy day?

Just chill with my wife. We will prepare our afternoon tea, talk about our day, and take a moment to enjoy each other’s company.

~ After a long day, Andres enjoys some afternoon tea with his wife ~

10. What would we most likely find you doing on the weekend?

I will be driving the kids somewhere, doing our weekly shopping, gardening, or playing soccer with the over 45’s.