Born in India, raised in Dubai, worked in Singapore before moving to Japan. The real story of Raj, the technical director who built TimeRex from scratch

This is an interview series introducing the team members behind Chouseisan and TimeRex. This time we will introduce Raj, the technical director.

His real name is Rajesh. He is affectionately known as “Raj-san” within the company. After joining Mixtend in April 2019, Raj-san has been leading the team as technical director since May of the following year. He is multilingual, speaking not only Japanese and English, but also Hindi and Chinese.

In this interview, we will take a closer look at Raj’s friendly personality and playful side, which can be seen not only in his impressive resume and skills!

First, please introduce yourself!

I am the technical director of the development team. I am in charge of the overall management of development work, including allocating development tasks, code reviews, design, and release management.

In my free time, I enjoy traveling, and I particularly like places with nature. I also like gaming, and on the weekends I play a variety of games on my PlayStation.

Before going fully remote, you often brought me souvenirs from your travels! First of all, please tell us where you were born and your background!

I am an Indian national, but I was born and raised in Dubai. My family consisted of my father, mother, older sister, and myself. Dubai is known as a financial center in the Middle East, and my father worked as a chartered accountant there. So the first computer I ever used was the one my father used for work.

Were you aiming to become an IT engineer from that time?

Yes. I think I was about 10 years old. Of course I respect my father, but I wasn’t interested in accounting work, which involves dealing with numbers. I wanted to be able to solve problems using computers. Looking back, that may have been the reason I wanted to become an IT engineer.

When did you start thinking about going abroad?

In Dubai, most people go on to study at universities abroad. In my case, my older sister had gone to America before me, so I was aware of the global world from an early age. So when I was 16, I went to Singapore, which has some of the most advanced educational institutions in Asia.

You studied at the School of Computing at the National University of Singapore, right? Graduated from the number one university in Asia, that’s amazing!

I went to university because I wanted to study computers, but my time living in Singapore was a valuable experience for me as a student, as I was able to learn a lot outside of my studies, such as honing my international perspective and interacting with talented people.

After graduating from university, I worked for about four foreign software customization companies in Singapore, where I was able to build a track record as an engineer.

What made you come to Japan?

Marrying my Japanese wife. I started studying Japanese in 2015 so that she could work in Japan when she returned, and we came to Japan in 2018.

I’m amazed at how quickly I learned Japanese. Do you have any tips for learning a language?

The trick is… actually, I learned Japanese from anime.

Oh! What kind of anime is it?

Doraemon and Crayon Shin-chan (laughs)

I felt a sudden sense of closeness to him (laughs).

Instead of straining yourself to study, why not start with something that you can enjoy and learn? (laughs)

Having fun is important! You work as a technical director developing products, but is there anything you place great importance on?

We are conscious of changing the content of releases depending on the phase of the product. For example, in the case of our TimeRex, when we first released it, we thought it was important to release it as soon as possible. Now that we have a certain number of users, we are focusing on how the features are being used and what features we can develop in the future to improve the product.

As for the team, it is important to listen carefully to and respect the opinions of all members. We have a system in place that allows members to take on challenges, such as design, front-end, back-end, etc., if they are interested, rather than focusing on one task.

What is the process for the Mixtend development team?

We use agile and scrum. We decide on tasks every week and assign them to each engineer. We review the sprint the following week and discuss what went well and what needs to be improved. We usually put together development content into one release every two weeks, have it tested, and then release it to the production environment. When we have a large feature, the cycle can be as long as one month.

Recently, new features have been added to TimeRex one after another. Do you do the designing when implementing these new features, Raj?

No, it depends on the content of the function. It is often designed by the person who is most familiar with the technology required to implement the function. Functions that do not require special knowledge can be done by anyone, so they are assigned to the member who is free at the time. Of course, members also review the design content with each other.

Once the implementation is complete, what is the flow for it to be reflected in the production environment?

We use Git-flow. When a task is completed, we upload it to Git, create a pull request, and have team members review the code. After that, we upload it to the development environment, have a QA engineer test it, and release it to the production environment.

So the path is passed around until it reaches the production environment! Our company is fully remote, so what is the main means of communication within the development team?

We basically use Slack. If we want to share our screens and talk, we use SlackCall, etc. Regular development team meetings are held once a week on Zoom.

Even when working remotely, the sense of distance is the same as when you’re in the office. Looking back on your time so far, is there anything that stands out in your mind?

Since we created TimeRex from scratch, it was an interesting experience to decide on the product name and domain. In most companies, you join an existing product. It was a valuable experience to be involved in the naming phase.

We had a lot of trouble deciding on a name back then (laughs). We solicited as many ideas as we could think of on Slack.

It was fun to see how the Japanese neologisms came to have funny meanings in English (laughs).

I wonder what would have happened if Raj wasn’t there (lol) Mixtend is Raj’s second company in Japan, right?

Yes, when I first came to Japan I joined a foreign IT company. But after learning about Mixtend’s business, I decided to join this company, hoping to utilize my experience and skills in the future.

Is there anything you like about the company?

Mixtend is my first experience working for a Japanese company, so I don’t know how it compares to others, but I think the fact that you can work fully remotely according to your lifestyle, that even if you don’t come into the office, members can communicate with each other quickly via Slack, and that the management team are psychologically close to each other.

Indeed, the company as a whole is pretty flat and casual. I think there’s a calm and comfortable sense of distance between people!

That’s right. For the past two years, we haven’t been able to get together due to the effects of COVID-19, but recently, our CEO, Kitano-san, has been creating opportunities for us to get together and deepen our relationships, which is fun. It might be ideal to focus on your own tasks remotely most of the time, and occasionally get together to exchange opinions in person and eat meals together.

That’s great! Let’s adjust it again with Chouseisan! By the way, what is your favorite food, Raj?

When you think of Indians, you think of curry, but my favorite Thai food is pad thai. I also like grilled meat and yakitori. I’m not yet a big fan of natto and octopus.

I was surprised to hear that it was Thai food (lol) Finally, please give us a message to those reading this blog along with your recommended Pad Thai restaurants!

The Pad Thai at the Thai restaurant “Krung Siam” in Jiyugaoka is delicious! I’d love to hold a welcome party for my new colleagues here!