BitBakery is growing again! We’re excited to welcome our newest BitBaker, Frank Calpito, to the team. Frank is an experienced full-stack developer passionate about continuous learning, creative problem solving, and working in the information technology and services industry.
Joining us as Senior Software Developer and Engineer, Frank is working from ‘BitBakery West’ in Calgary, Alberta.
We had the chance to have a virtual chat with Frank to see how it’s been working as part of the team so far.
How did you get your start in software development?
Back in high school in the Philippines, I took a computer programming class. I did very well and enjoyed it, so I decided to take my interest further and study information technology and software development at the University of Baguio.
The summer after school, I took my first programming job in Washington, DC, leading me to my future roles as I developed my career as a software developer. From there, I’ve worked remotely for companies in Seattle, New York, Arizona, Toronto, and more, eventually settling in Calgary, Alberta with my family.
How did you learn about BitBakery?
I worked in a very corporate environment where the nature of work is very confined. You don’t really get to see your impact or interact with clients.
I knew that I needed a challenge to continuously learn and improve. Whatever makes you uncomfortable is your next opportunity for growth. To get this challenge, I knew working for a startup was the way to go. I came across a posting for the position at BitBakery on Indeed, and because there was a remote work option advertised, so I applied.
You’re one of our first remote employees – what’s that been like?
The transition has been so easy. I didn’t even notice it. There was a lot of code already here to work with and learn, so I didn’t have to do it from scratch. Also, the team has been very open and helpful. If I have a question, I just ask, and I’m easily put on the right track to complete the next goal in the project.
What’s the challenge of working remotely, and how have you overcome it?
Working remotely has been the norm for me for four years. I was prepared for many challenges people faced in 2020 when the world began working from home due to the pandemic. I had a lot of friends call me for advice on how to work remotely.
I’d suggest to everyone to make sure you have a separate workspace from living space. When working from home, it’s harder to get that mental cue to turn off from work and switch gears to rest. Work-life balance is essential, and you have to put in a little more effort to achieve that when working from home.
Other than that, I’d say the biggest challenge is the difference in time zone. I typically wake up and get to work by 6:00 a.m., so even that hasn’t been a challenge.
I don’t think I would trade working remotely for commuting and packing a lunch every day. I see myself working remotely for the rest of my career. When I work remotely, I get to take back all that in-between time and spend more time with my family, which is super valuable to me.
What do you do in your free time?
In my free time, I enjoy learning and practicing new languages, both speaking and coding languages. I have learned Spanish and Korean and a long list of coding languages — too many to count.
Lately, all my free time has been spent with my family. My wife and I have a five-year-old son and a 10-month-old daughter, so our hands are pretty full. We’ve been having fun playing “Moving Out” on Nintendo Switch, which is a ridiculous physics-based moving simulator game.
What technologies/stacks are you using now on a project?
On my first day at BitBakery, I got tossed into something completely new. I have done a lot of work in LAMP, Codeigniter, Ionic Framework, Typescript, Angular, and React. I am experienced with the development of custom CMS. Since starting my first projects at BitBakery, I’ve added Vue, Golang, Nodejs, and MongoDB to my stack.
What’s something you want to learn more about?
I’m curious about learning Ruby on Rails, a server-side web application model–view–controller (MVC) framework written in Ruby. It’s just different from what I’ve worked with before, so I’m curious to learn something new.
We love welcoming new talent to the BitBakery team and are excited to have Frank on board!
Want to learn more about working at BitBakery? Check out our BitBakery Blog or follow us on Instagram @bitbakery for more!
