Does playing strategy games help with navigate in a sea of data, and what’s the key to living, rather than surviving in a new country? We had a talk with Yago Vieira, who, with a degree in computer science and eight years in the industry, is no stranger to a challenge.
Hi Yago! Tell me about yourself!
Well, I have a degree in computer science and I’ve been working in IT for about eight years now and overall, I’m a pretty nerdy guy. I play a lot of card games, I even played competitive for a while. I like games that challenge you intellectually. I would say it’s pretty standard for a guy like me, a lot of computer nerds end up here, haha.
Very strategic then?
Yes, it’s like chess, almost. I find that the culture here in Sweden is closer to my interests compared to Brazil. There, people go out partying or play FIFA, but don’t play computer games or board games for example. Not everyone has their own computer, so if you want to play computer games, you really have to commit.
Most of my work is to understand the business’s needs and turn it into technical solutions
Did that affect the move to Sweden?
Haha, maybe? I knew a bit about Sweden when I was younger, thanks to Basshunter and his songs, dota was a huge deal back then. But the real reason is that my wife has diabetes, and we knew that the medical treatment here is among the best in the world. So, we moved to Gothenburg which is great. Perfectly sized, everything you need is here, without it being a huge city.
What does a typical day at work look like for you?
Most of my work revolves around understanding the business’s needs and translating that into technical solutions. Often you receive a lot of data, just loads and loads, and you must figure out how to align it and make it useful, as well as improving the quality of the data. You need to deliver something that’s helpful for them, to fulfill their needs.
Sounds like you need to be quite creative?
Yes! Sometimes, the data doesn’t even exist, so you have to figure out where to even find it, and who to get it from. That’s why I spend most of my time in meetings, understanding and helping the business owners. That’s the hard part, at the end of the day I might have produced maybe three lines of code.
What do you do when you’re not at work?
I spend my time either gaming, hitting the gym, or learning Swedish. One thing that I heard a lot when I moved here, is that you could live in Sweden without knowing the language. But I feel it’s more like you can survive without knowing Swedish, but you can’t actually live.
How does that affect you?
When I lived in Brazil, I used to do a lot of martial arts, but that’s not been possible here without knowing the language, the same goes for local gaming communities. But I feel that I’ve learnt enough now to find and join some communities.
Do you miss your old communities?
Actually, most of my friends now live in Europe, and I think I visited them more now than when we lived closer together. This year, I already visited all of them. So I’m happy where I’m at.
Lastly – what’s your advice to new developers?
Definitely go for working rather than studying it. The academic way is very good, of course. But it can be very different from the work you’re actually going to do. Start by learning code, then seek out internships to decide if it’s for you. Also, there is a lot of different things within developing, not only math and code, some people work more towards design, some only do code and if you take the academic route it’s going to be hard to know which part you enjoy the most. Just go out there and learn!
