Today’s workplace no longer relies solely on in-person meetings and side-by-side workstations. Remote workers have revolutionized the ways employers seek out and hire employees. The best talent, no matter where in the world they live, is now available.

Spry Group took advantage of remote developers when they hired Martín Freytes in August 2015. Since then, Martín has contributed to a number of the company’s projects while continuing to live in Portugal. In this month’s employee spotlight, we talk with Martín about his career as a developer and how he sees himself growing with Spry Group.

Growing Into a Developer

Martín studied computer engineering at Simon Bolivar University in Venezuela. During those years, he studied web development on his own. While living in Venezuela, Martín worked at a retail company, where he developed a complete Intranet in Symfony.

From Venezuela, Martín moved to Panama for four years. There he worked as a web developer for two other companies before joining Spry Group.

Spry Group attracted Martín due to how the company strives for innovation. Likewise, they are supportive of their employees and push them to learn new things all the time. He’s also drawn to the company’s collaborative culture. Employees are always trying to help each other. At Spry Group, this is how the best work gets accomplished.

Bringing a Skillset to Spry Group

Martín has different strengths across different areas of programming. Regarding languages, he considers himself best with Python and Javascript. “I always try to keep [up on] the best practices of each,” he explained. Regarding frameworks, he has solid knowledge of Django, enjoys working with Flask, and with AngularJS on the frontend. Martín is receptive to criticism on his code:

“I feel that any feedback helps me to improve my skills as a developer,” he said.

Spry Group has kept Martín busy. Projects he’s worked on include:

• TypeNetwork: The growing marketplace for type designers and foundries to show their portfolios for licensing. “We did the store in AngularJS and [used] Django [for the] backend,” Martín explained. “Currently we’re working on a new endpoint for the administration of the content and styles.”

• Jangl: Martín is currently leading two projects for Jangl. The first involves connecting the people who submit leads with the providers who use them though a backend integration. The second is the creation of a form that collects lead data from provider’s websites.

• TrashRadar: In an effort to help build a cleaner, more sustainable Panama City, his project currently called “TrashRadar” is here to help. It exists as a crowd-sourced public works app that helps the citizens of Panama City alert sanitation officials to when trash needs to be collected via GPS and cloud-based technology.

Part of this venture for Martín with these projects was learning new frameworks and maintaining Spry Group’s best practices. Perhaps the most daring, however, was taking on the Team Leader role for the first time.

“[It’s an] interesting challenge because the first step every day is to keep everyone [on] task,” Martín explained. This includes addressing any blockers and helping team members with any doubts they have in their development processes. “With that I’m feeling that I’m helping [them grow] as developers,” Martín said.

”Being a team leader, the people that I’m working with and I are learning all the time with any >new goal; a new way to do things, and how to manage the team.”

Martín loves to drive his motorcycle, and is thinking about cruising around Europe in the not-too-distant future. He’s also a foodie and plays tennis in his free time off the clock. Like all Spry Group team members, Martín’s interests aren’t limited to development.