Ubuntu Wiki

About Me

Hi, my name is Gustavo, I am 22 years old and I live in Portugal. I am currently finishing my master's degree in Industrial and Firms Economics, while looking to start my professional career in my fields of expertise - management, strategy, economics.

I am a passionate person for technology. Unfortunately I don't possess any high-end knowledge, thus I am not able to create the change. However, there is lot more that technology to develop. I could have invested in some sort of education on that topic, but I believe that doing one thing very well done, is more important than doing several, but not so perfect. Also, that allows me to be faster, since I am aware of my resources. However, there is always information that we can acquire, and that is what I am looking for in Ubuntu's communities. The possibility to meet and exchange experiences with many other people, while learning new stuff every day. And, of course, being a Team Leader is also exciting, since it keeps bringing me new and tough challenges, on a daily basis. Since this is on a voluntary basis, you can imagine that inspiring and coordinating efforts is extremely difficult - that's why I created my blog.

Past Experiences

I have worked for 6 months at an US-based IT Firm, where they developed productivity tools. I was hired to study the viability to create a branch office in Portugal but there were a lot of restraints to it, so they I had to participate more actively in the management affairs. Moreover, we both realized I could be useful in other tasks while researching and so I started developing the KPI control tool for them. However, they didn't had any KPI back then, so I also took part of the 2014 KPI definition. Other issues came up and I dealt with a lot of tasks. For instance, developing a strategy to reach and penetrate the Chinese market, back-office management, and hiring people. I am graduated in Bank and Insurance management, with a final average of 14 (out of 20). I have also enrolled in extra-curricular courses I felt important for my set of skills, such as Competitive Strategy and Developing Innovative Ideas.

Current Work

Industrial and Firms Economics Master's Degree - Still finishing the master's thesis.

Phonebloks - Partnership manager (Since November 2014)

Lubuntu Wiki & Docs Team - Team Leader (Since December 2014)

Challenges & Future

As mentioned before, I am currently looking for a job and start exploring my knowledge and willingness to succeed. However, it has not been an easy task. I'm too young, inexperienced and resourceless, in a very tough world, where being great is not enough. I have already figured out that Ubuntu has opened wide by awareness and knowledge of the IT world. Unfortunately I can't contribute directly to it by developing apps, developing distro's, but I am happy enough to get means for these guys. Either way, I wish to learn more about programming, specially in the most common languages in my world - R, LaTex, VBA and Java. I truly believe these tools will enhance most of my capabilities and, eventually, will make me an interesting person. Since I have been collaborating with the Ubuntu's communities, I learnt a lot from them and I believe I also have contributed a lot to the development of Lubuntu - well, I've also translated stuff for Ubuntu when I had a lot of free time. I'd like to eventually apply to the official membership, as that shows that people recognize my efforts and work in here.

I am also interested learning some leadership skills in non-profit and open source projects. It requires a specific mindset and a preparation, since most of the people involved are volunteers and, therefore, the ability to convince others to comply with the leader's goals is very, veeerryyyy, difficult.

Testimonials

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