2021 in Review: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Uh yeah, 2021 is indeed a wonderful year.

For me, the tradition of publishing annual reviews began last year (2020 in review). I'm also glad for the opportunity to write another review this year.

I'll start with a list of things I expected to get done but didn't.

Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently. — Henry Ford

The Bad and Ugly

This list contains some things I hoped to achieve or failed to do or some rejections in 2021. 🥲

• Got about 150+ rejections, and some didn't even respond
• a San Francisco based Company rejected me after the hack week test, which was meant to be the final step to get on board as a full-time software engineer
• Got introduced to a Startup, became the CTO and was betrayed after it was silently acquired(a story for another day)
• I wanted to engage in more speaking opportunities than writing, but I failed; I hope to do more in 2022
• I was depressed at some point but thanked God I found my love(Technical writing)
• Applied to speak at several events but was rejected for some reasons I don't understand 🥲

The Good

Growth

• I got a new job as a Backend Engineer with a startup in the US.

• I Started Building several solutions for GT Bank and Contributed / Co-founded some projects, both paid and unpaid.

• Finally, i bought a new Macbook 2018 15' (16gb, 512 SSD, corei7, 4gb dedicated).

• Got several calls and referrals on Backend Engineering Role.

• One of my favourite projects that I actively/currently contribute to went live FundmyLaptop.

• Another Big WIN, I was Nominated as a GitHub Star.
  Announced here

• I Became AngelHack Country Ambassador, a San Francisco based global hackathon Organization

• Became Section.io spotlight member with over 66k+ views on the articles published

• Creator Spotlight interviewed by Taelfeed, check here

• Got five interview requests in the last quarter of the year on a Developer Advocate / Technical writing / Full-stack JavaScript Engineer Role. (More info later)

• I was Promoted at my current workplace to a Backend Lead ( Got Fresh news too✌️)

• Won 2 awards (Top 10 Writer 2021 and Top Reader 2021) on @hashnode with over 50k active members

Content Creation

• Made my first million (NGN) from content creation

• Wrote over 69+ articles this year, including paid articles

• I became a FreecodeCamp author, and I wrote solid technical content Check Here. Big thanks to the FreecodeCamp Editorial team for making the process seamless

• I started writing for Section Engineering I was paid in $$(Big Win 😌)

• I started writing more articles on my blog

• I became an Author at HackMamba, and I was also part of their editorial team during the Content Creation Hackathon sponsored by Auth0 and Cloudinary.

• I was invited to join Showwcase founding creator.

• I did live coding building a NodeJs app using HarperDB as the database.
  Link to Video

• I became a contributing Author at Aviyel, Did a live coding demo and finally, I got a beautiful swag box from Aviyel.
  Link to Video.

• Wrote an article on dev to that got 40k+ views within 48hrs and topped the trending list on day 5.

• Got an invite to write a paid Content ($$ of course) from 3 different companies worldwide within a week.

• Participated in the Auth0 and Cloudinary hackathon

• I accepted an invitation to become an author of Contentlab.io and AppSmith

• Hit 160k+ views on dev.to 🥳🥳🥳

• I was Featured on global Teach Blogs created by @Marko Denic

Community Engagement

• I got accepted as Open Source Africa Hero in Yaba, Lagos. (One of the things I love to do more in 2022)

• Became a mentor in the Nodejs track at DSC X SCA OAU Mentorship Program.

• After mentoring for months, I Became the backend development channel lead @ SheCodeAfrica.

• Volunteered at the Unstack 3.0 tech event/workshop on the 6th of November 2021

All the Experience captured here

• Volunteered at the GDG DevFest in Lagos on the 3rd of December, 2021

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SqLF5Idmd1Y

Speaking Engagement

• I spoke at the Frontstack.io event. Super excited about this because it was my first speaking event for the year and my second speaking engagement.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LzyoqRNVzsI&t=2318s

• Another Speaking Engagement at Solo learn: About Burnout(On telegram)

• Invited to speak on "Job Opportunities for Junior Developers" organised/coordinated by @Ayodele Samuel Adebayo and W3Schools

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NY6_2ozQilE&t=2971s

Gifts

• Received my first international gift(swags) from daily.dev
• Received another beautiful SWAG box from Aviyel

And lots more.

I created a link to view all my contents, both paid and unpaid; check it out 👇

https://linktr.ee/olanetsoft

Conclusion

Thank you for going through this content. We will go harder in the year 2022. ✌️

I'd love to connect with you at Twitter | LinkedIn | GitHub | Portfolio

See you in my next blog article. Take care!!!