For Nadia Suleyman, a career in software engineering wasn’t always part of the plan. Until a gap year shifted her focus to tech and opened the door to a future at the Financial Times.
Now an engineer at the FT, she reflects on what drew her to programming, how her team supports fast-moving journalism, and why reading as many pull requests as possible has become one of her most valuable habits.
What motivated you to choose a career in software development, and what’s the story behind your move to The Financial Times?
I was planning to go into another field when I was younger, but during my gap year, I grew more interested in programming and decided to apply for Computer Science at university instead.
When I graduated, my university posted a Technology Intern role at the FT and I applied which is how I started my career here. In Product and Technology, I’ve met many talented and generous people to whom I owe a lot for mentoring me!
How does your average day unfold at the Financial Times, and what does team collaboration look like?
My day varies, but it usually begins with a morning standup with my team. I like to calibrate my thoughts and prepare my questions before that meeting so I can ask everything I need, to move forward with my tasks.
When I start to work on my task, I tend to break down my tasks into a checklist of things I want to investigate, try or test - that's how my brain works well. There’s a few meetings in the middle of the day between either my team or project based teams.
How do you balance writing clean, scalable code with the fast-paced demands of digital journalism?
We have an outstanding product team that helps prioritise work so we can focus on building solutions. We aim to make our apps easier to change and we regularly discuss any pain points in dev chats as well as helping each other daily. Having an app that is easy to understand in all its layers is ideal when you need to fix an issue or add a feature.
Can you share your main tech stack and the one tool that’s absolutely critical for you?
Our main programming language in Editorial Technology is JavaScript. We also use TypeScript, AWS, Fastly, MongoDB and various testing libraries.
The one tool I can’t live without is Nodemon for JavaScript projects running on Node.js projects. There are similar tools across other languages but this one is a must! It's a tool which restarts your app automatically as you make file changes.
Looking back, what's a key lesson about software development you wish you'd learned sooner?
One lesson that has benefited me is to try and read as many pull requests as possible. I’ve learnt so much recently just reading through how other engineers structure their code. It’s something that shouldn’t take too long, if the pull request is well documented. There’s a lot to learn from others and we often won’t have time to pair as frequently as we’d like, and it’s proven to be just as insightful. I wish I’d started doing it earlier.
What’s your approach to staying updated with new technologies or best practices in the industry?
In Internal Products, engineers move teams regularly, but there are slight variations in the tech stack that make switching teams interesting without being too overwhelming. It's fascinating to see how the apps work together, each with its own distinct approach. Looking back, I've learned a lot on the job. Outside of work, I like to read Medium blogs on tech - and I’ve definitely signed up for far too many tech newsletters! I highly recommend the latter, you can stumble across some great work.
Outside of coding, what are some of your passions or hobbies that keep you inspired?
I like learning languages and I’m surrounded by polyglots in my life so they motivate me. I’ve been sharpening my Korean grammar and I spend dedicated time learning Arabic and French. This year, I’ve started exploring embroidery in my free time. I still have a lot to learn, but for now, I’m enjoying the quiet pace of it.
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