We are Polar Squad. In this blog series, we introduce the people of our amazing company. Next up is Firas Fafi!

Tell us a bit about yourself and your background?

My name is Firas, and I’m originally from Tunisia. I've been working as a DevOps Consultant at Polar Squad since early 2020. After my graduation, I had the chance to be an early adopter of DevOps culture and practices.

I have extensive international experience in this field and am looking forward to continuing on the same path.

Regardless of the buzzwords and titles, my vision is to grow, use my engineering skills and contribute to the success of any business or team I work with.

What was the path that led you into becoming a DevOps consultant for Polar Squad?

During my graduation project, I was lucky to work closely with experienced IT teams and see their daily challenges to get their code released. I was mainly doing build and release management and implicitly applying and following what is called today DevOps.

After that, I’ve chosen to continue on the same path. It was hard at an early stage, but following the best practices and knowing how to apply DevOps, I’ve found myself growing exponentially and having a significant impact on teams.

Based on my experiences, I saw that working with just one business could hinder my growth and achievements. So, I decided to do DevOps/SRE consultancy at Polar Squad, which matches my career goals and allows me to gain as much experience as possible in this field.

What tools do you like to use in your work?

For me, it’s not really about the tool, but the way it should be used to achieve such a goal.

In my humble opinion, you should always consider whatever works best for the teams and encourages best practices.

I like mostly to draw inspiration from the daily challenges faced by the teams. I’m always trying to anticipate how they will develop over time.

What sets Polar Squad apart from other companies you worked at?

In Polar Squad, we say: “Our people come first,” and we try to practice that every day. It’s not just empty words.

We are self-driven and act as a small community.

We share a passion for DevOps and related topics. You get to work with amazing people from different backgrounds and paths, united by this shared passion.

I genuinely believe that each of us has what I like to call a “DevOps DNA,” something unique and valuable. In Polar Squad, you get the chance to explore this and brainstorm with all your colleagues.

How would you describe the culture in PS?

It’s magic; trusting and empowering self-driven people.

Open communication and outstanding support are a few key factors in Polar Squad’s thriving culture.

Positive vibes and success are contagious for all members of Polar Squad, and so far, it’s still doing great despite a few challenges, mainly due to COVID and working remotely.

Tell us about your day-to-day routines?

There is no routine in Polar Squad. You are the owner of your day.

This means the consultant has a lot of options. In my case, my day looks something like this:

• Work on projects, solve customer challenges

• Learn and build knowledge while waiting for a new project

• Participate and collaborate with my colleagues on internal company events or projects.

What kind of technical challenges do you meet at your work?

Most of the technical challenges are related to customized solutions and technical debt faced by my clients.

There have been situations where the team lost control over their stack, ending up with critical issues that forced them to burn resources just to keep the wheels turning.

Other side effects are poor documentation and knowledge distribution across team members, something that is surprisingly often ignored or not considered in the long run.

One of the skills that I’m using and continuously developing is dealing with these situations, having a broad vision and offering suitable solutions for a wide array of cases.

How does it feel to work with developer teams? Do we have a common ground?

In my opinion, it’s important to understand the real culture and practices of DevOps.

We don’t only share the same ground; we are part of the same team!

Unfortunately, we are still seeing that some teams consider DevOps as being just about trending tools and automation. I'm a true believer that the success of DevOps practices and culture in such a company depends on how we interact with dev teams.

My solutions are built on the valuable data I’m collecting from dev teams concerning their challenges and opportunities. Ideas exchanged between parties play a crucial part in shaping final decisions.

For me, this approach is the key ingredient to making DevOps-related practices and culture shifts successful.

All this requires excellent communication skills. In my experience, most dev teams don’t take well to being outside their comfort zones and mainly focus on the here and now, carrying out their siloed tasks.

Our job as consultants, then, is to be understanding and supportive of dev teams. We need to offer them comfort and confidence while working closely to tackle challenges.

Curious about the work possibilities Polar Squad offers? Read more on our Careers page!