The Use Of Technology to Power Education By – Adesoji Bello, Network Automation Engineer, Facebook.

Thank you very much for joining our interview.

Please give us a brief introduction about yourself, and what you do currently. So what are your educational background and your professional background?

Thanks once again, for having me for today’s session. I finished my bachelor’s in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Lagos with a first-class. My focus then was telecommunications engineering working with AppZone and then, as an infrastructure engineer, before I rose to oversee the engineering and security section. Later down the line, I moved to the US for my Master’s in Electrical and Computer Engineering at Michigan Tech University where I focused on Underwater Wireless Communications.

While doing my Master’s, I had a co-op with DocuSign, where I worked as a Network Automation Engineer. Currently, I work with Facebook as a Network Automation Engineer.

Is there anything that actually inspired you to go into Underwater Wireless Communication? Was there any particular trigger for that?

That’s a very good question. Previously, there has been a lot of research and a lot of tech in terrestrial communication. When I say terrestrial wireless communication, I mean, the way we communicate via GSM, the way we use broadband Internet, and there’s been very little or no research going on in the water and there are a lot of benefits that we stand to gain.

Mainly, if you look at the oil and gas offshore exploration itself, there are a lot of undersea cables that are being used in terms of detection of where we have like the oil deposit itself. So that was one of the sparks that made me go into that kind of research. I also tried to leverage the fact that I had prior experience in understanding wireless communication, and I felt I needed to kind of apply it to something that was very, very interesting and exciting to me.

I know that you currently have some personal projects going on in Nigeria. Can you introduce us to your company? What would be an elevator pitch for someone who does not know about your company and your services?

The name of the company is Cyber Fleets and Cyber Fleets was designed to try to bridge the gap between instructors and students in Nigeria. One of our primary goals then was to improve learning outcomes and use technology to power education. Beyond that, we created a product called KlassConnect. KlassConnect is a learning software, which is the flagship product of the company. And up to date, we have a number of schools who are using this product to kind of ease their learning and try to ensure that learning is much more impactful to both the students and the school.

Also, we understand the fact that there are a couple of infrastructural gaps in our educational sector in Nigeria, and one of the key things we had to do was to kind of create some allied services in Cyber Fleet that also tries to ensure that some key basic amenities or key basic dependencies that require the platform to work in schools, we’re also offering the services. These range from enterprise infrastructure and security to software development to a host of other things that we’re also trying to do to ensure that schools are much more positioned to leverage tech to drive their learning itself.

That’s really good that we have people out there that are trying to bridge the gap in the educational system in Nigeria that has been abandoned by the government. It’s really very motivating to hear stories like yours. So the next question would be what audience does your company cater to? And in the past, have you had any noteworthy partners or if there’s any you work with presently, or some that you are in talks with for the future?

Our target audience is secondary schools, universities, learning academies, and the capacity development section of corporates, more or less, like the corporate enterprise. Our market spans beyond Nigeria and a host of other African countries. You did mention partners, we have some local partners in Nigeria, we have The Tony Elemelu Entrepreneurship Foundation (TEF), we have the Nigerian Communications Commission. We also have a couple of partnerships with some state governments and the Ministry of Education as well. As regards regional partners, we partner with a leading EdTech company in Zambia called “Book It”, those are the ones that are also trying to drive the use of our product in Southern Africa.

That’s impressive. I do love the fact that your company is wide reached. So what’s your bigger picture? Do you plan to take it outside of Africa or cover the whole of Africa? So what exactly is the big picture for your company?

The bigger picture, for now, is to still maintain our presence in Africa and just try to attain dominance. The market share is very huge, and the players in the market are still very, very limited. And if there’s one reason why we are also trying to narrow our scope is the fact that there are a lot of similar solutions, out there like that in other continents, which are also doing very, very fine but if there’s one thing that they’ve not been able to kind of penetrate our kind of market, is because of the costs. And one thing where we’re being very competitive is the fact that we have a very competitive cost in terms of pricing itself, and our solution offering. So still narrowing down the focus to Nigeria and a number of countries within Africa itself for now.

There is nothing that beats people that know a culture and provide services for the culture. What motivated you to go into computer sciences? What motivates you to stand up every morning to do what you do? You said you work for a multinational company, and you still have other projects on the side? How do you balance it?

That’s a very, very good question. And I guess, quite a number of people keep asking that question. If there’s something that motivates me in this life it’s that I always strive to be a better version of myself. And what I mean, trying to be a better person with myself is the fact that day-in-day-out, when I wake up, I try to see how well I can improve my technical skills, my soft skills. By doing this, I find it interesting that it has a positive impact on people itself, and even on my daily doings itself. All this is in line with trying to build a stronger and healthier society. I think those are very key things that really motivate me, which push me every time I wake up. In my mind, I’m like, okay, what can I do? What are the things I can do? And all it shows is, it makes you know that you are really playing an active path and you’re contributing your quota to your society not necessarily internally but also externally as well.

Did you always know that this was what you were going to do or did you come to that realization at some point in your life?

 Yes, I’ll try to go down the line of history. When I was about to enter my university from high school, I kind of had a passion for computing then, not necessarily computing alone, but then I also had a very keen interest in mathematics and physics itself. But asides from that when I came into my undergrad, in my 200 level, we offered a course called C++ which was more or less one of the two programming languages then. Apparently then in school, we had to just take the course within one or two semesters but we had the option of going to another department, which is computer science to take an extended version of the course and because of my interest then I did it as an elective in my 300 level, and that kind of honed my interest in programming itself. Also, while I was also trying to hone my skills in programming, I majored then in Electrical and Electronics Engineering which was wireless communication. So it was more or less looking at a hybrid approach of trying to use programming to enhance the telecommunication infrastructure in whatever I’m trying to do.

That is very good. And it’s very evident that you do have passion for what you do because you’ve remained steadfast in the path and you are becoming a beacon for people to actually look up to. So our next question is going to talk about the flagships of your education or your career. So we’re focusing on what exactly made you successful at what you do?

Okay, I will try to pin it down to about two, or three. The first one, which is very, very crucial to me, is the fact that I’m very hardworking. And when I mean, very hardworking, I don’t necessarily know myself as very hardworking, it’s people around me who work with me who know I’m very hardworking. So I try to go the extra mile to get things done. Which is also very, very key in my life. Something I felt that must have shaped me to be where I am today is that I’m not really always the smartest person where I am, it takes me longer to understand and get a concept of things but whatever pain I tried to take to understand things, it kind of sticks longer than expected. So these two major things, I really find to be very critical in my life, so far.

Awesome, so that means you mentioned hard work, and just putting more time to understand things, and then it does stick, which I feel they’re very good ingredients to make a successful career. So the next question talks about sharing milestones, and how you conquered them because when we look at life, life is never just a straight road. There are always going to be bumps along the way. So can you share one or two with us and how you actually overcame that milestone?

The first, which is very personal and dear to me, is when we rolled out our flagship product, which is KlassConnect. We conceptualized, we designed, we developed, and we rolled out this product within eight months. And if I can pick up something that was very, very instrumental in us getting this product out was the fact that there was a proper definition of our vision and also, we had a much more structured implementation plan. We had a couple of hiccups whereby we had people that were working for us that had to leave in a very short time words but we stayed very focused on the vision and the fact that we needed to make an impact in the educational sector of Nigeria, which was very, very passionate to us, is one thing that I really hold firmly to me in terms of like one of my key milestones in life. Another thing why I try to point out this is the fact that we all know that the last year, which is 2020, the world was kind of like at a standstill when the COVID-19 pandemic really halted a lot of things and it had a major blow in the educational sector of Nigeria. Thankfully, we have the vision years back to roll out Class Connect, which is like an e-learning platform. We realised that a number of schools then adopted the product in a very short time because we felt that even with the COVID-19 pandemic, we still had a product that ensured that learning was still continuous in schools, and instructors and students were also trying to exchange different contents in a very short while. Not necessarily especially putting the educational sector in Nigeria on a standstill but also moving in the event of any, unfortunate or unforeseen incidents.

Second, to me, I think this is much more on a professional side, not necessarily on the entrepreneurship side. During my days in Africa. When I finished my bachelor’s, I was privileged to get a job as a Network Engineer then with AppZone. AppTech is a leading FinTech company in Nigeria, and they have a very good presence in Western Africa. To just cut the long story short, I was still doing my NYSC then which is a mandatory service for new graduates in Nigeria and I was barely about six months into the job. Unfortunately, the lead, who was like the manager I was reporting to, had to transition to another job, meaning he left the company. We had about three resources then and so when the person left we had two. Apparently being a much more senior person compared to the other person that was there, I noticed that the management saw some potential in me in the fact that in a very short time, I was really delivering on the set tasks to ensure that the infrastructure of the organization was very stable with a high-performance system, I was made the acting head then, more or less like one year after school and it was actually the litmus test for me, I mean, I had very big shoes to fill. Interestingly, in my evaluation, which is more or less, the probation period was about eight months. It was very powerful based on the fact that I was very, very hardworking, and well-coordinated, and I ensured that I had a very set vision and I drove the implementation in phases.  lived up to expectation, I was made a substantive end of the infrastructure of the company. I feel those two things define the way I see myself and it’s more or less a wake-up call to do more and try to create better systems wherever you belong. 

Yeah, very, very good. I know a lot of people talk about having opportunities, but not a lot of them know what to do when the opportunities actually come knocking. So the fact that that happened, and he made the best out of it and came out victorious, really says a lot about your character. And it’s no surprise that it’s one of the milestones that led you to where you are right now.

So our next question is to just inquire about your plans moving forward with your career and or your personal life.

I will regard that as a midterm slash long-term goal. So my plan in the next two years is to hone my skills in DevOps and network automation and try to use these skills to configure and manage very huge infrastructure, which is a skill that is supporting systems, or applications that are used by billions of users. I’m currently doing this is where I work, which is Facebook, and I hope to get better and try to perfect some key areas I feel I’m kind of deficient in within two years. So that’s more or less like a timeline between 2021 and 2023.

For the next two years, 2023 – 2025, I plan to kind of transition to more or less a managerial position.

With realizing my technical leadership itself, and the experience I’ve been able to gather in the past years, to drive people or to drive changes in an organization, using people that are working with me, more or less like still achieving the business objective, but also trying to inspire people who are also working with me. So it’s more or less like a managerial perspective on what I’m trying to do. And within that time space, which is more or less like 2025 and beyond, I feel much more inclined toward helping people so I try to go the extra mile to ensure I make a positive impact on people. So it’s more or less like me trying to come up with some like-minded folks and see how well we can mentor the upcoming generation of Nigerian youth students especially those who are very interested in STEM and see how well we can properly coordinate and navigate their career for excellence and for them to be able to succeed Bearing in mind that this particular field we belong, we have endless opportunities there. So it’s something that’s very, very interesting for me to ensure I also tag people along while I’m growing.

Yeah, that’s actually really great because currently in Nigeria, the education system and the professional system don’t have a very synergistic handshake, where students come out of school, and they have absolutely no idea what the whole professional life is all about. So I think mentorship is a way to actually bridge the gap between these two. And it’s good to know that you’re working towards that for your future goals.

It’s something that’s definitely going to help the growth of the youth of Nigeria, who, in turn, is going to change the direction of our economy. So our next question is, I know, you briefed about this when you were talking about what you do with Class Connect, but how important is education for the future of technology in Nigeria?

We cannot rule out the fact that qualitative education has a way of driving and creating a better society. So a good scenario is that if you look at the first-world countries themselves, look at countries who are leading the pack, right? You will try to see and check the standards of the educational sector, you come to realize that it’s on a very, very high end. And both of us will agree that it’s something that is still a bit lagging in Nigeria, and something that we also need to work on. So in order to sustain this momentum, it’s very important for us as private individuals, or even as government or stakeholders to actively invest in the sector to ensure that we can also compete actively with other nations across the world. And another thing that is very, very important, which I always try to mention is that it’s one thing for you to go to school, it’s one thing for you to be well educated but there’s something I know everyone tries to take out. If you see an educated person, you clearly agree with me that the level of critical thinking and problem-solving approach is different from someone who is not well educated. So what I’m just trying to say in essence, is that we are looking at the fact that this is education, right?, And this is how we can use technology to address most of our pain points. So in order for us to sustain this momentum we have a couple of startups in Nigeria that are also trying to disrupt the space, and are trying to come up with a novel or existing technologies to improve the system. What I’m trying to say in essence, is that a much more educated society will improve more in what you’re doing and try to create a better product, a much more competitive product that we can also export to the greater world itself.

Your answer then feeds into our next question what exactly is your vision for Nigeria? personally? What do you think? Where do you think you want Nigeria to be?

I pray to see a country where the protection of lives and properties is very paramount to the government. I also am hoping to see a country where the key decision-makers more or less like people that occupy the corridors of power are people with competence, people with capability, and people with integrity because you can never really doubt the fact that when you put in people with the right skills and mindsets, in a leadership position, definitely, it translates top down in terms of how the society and the country are growing. So I’m looking at a situation where things like that are going to happen. But that being said, what I always try to tell people is that we can always hope and pray for a government to do work. As private individuals or stakeholders in the country itself, I think it’s also very important for us to see how we can contribute our quota to the growth of the country. It is something I’m doing using my computer, which is Cyber Fleets using our own product which is Class Connect. What we’re trying to do is to ensure that we’re using technology to power education by trying to improve the learning outcomes and the country itself and even beyond. 

Well, I couldn’t agree more. I think Nigerians really need to change the way they think. Waiting for the government or waiting for public bodies instead of actually starting to internalize the change and looking for what they can do for the country. So thank you very much for those wise words. And then that will lead us to a final question, looking at where you are currently, and all that you’ve achieved, do you have any advice to your younger self, of basically what you could have done when you were younger to probably better help, better achieve what you’ve achieved now or like, a higher goal for yourself?

Yes, I do. I’ll try to answer this question by also looking at the key attributes, which I felt have been very, very important, which are more or less self-development and being hard working. If there’s something I felt I should have done earlier that would have made me better, I noticed then back then in Nigeria, a lot of younger ones don’t really see the positives in having a network

The ability to network with people not necessarily within your own particular sector, but even trying to extend beyond. I felt that that would have had a better impact on my own growth itself. So if there’s something I felt that I should have done back then is networking with people more, meeting people more, and trying to see where I can expand beyond my own niche. If you ask me why I’m laying so much emphasis on the power of what networking can do – my transition from school then to entrepreneurship when we started Cyber Fleet and Class Connects; that was when I saw the importance of knowing people. So if there’s one thing I want us to understand is the fact that even if you’re in business, you should understand the dynamics of the market you’re operating, in and work in a society where knowing people can take you further than even the quality of what you’re trying to sell. So during our rollout of the product, I felt we capitalized at some point with the fact that we’re trying to build some relationships then, which also aided the fact that we had to abort some customers. But however, I felt if previously I had understood the importance of this, I would have done more in that part, because it would have taken us further than where we are right now.

No wiser words have been said because I didn’t understand the importance of networking too even till I finished university and I started my master’s. And I can tell you, almost everything that I have achieved right now has been because I just stepped out of my comfort zone and started talking to people and trying to build something with people.

Thank you so much. So that actually brings us to the conclusion of the interview. Again, thank you very much for your time. And I’m very sure with all the words of wisdom that you shared with us, the whole point is actually to try to move the younger generation, to give them people to look up to so I’m sure you don’t mind people contacting your LinkedIn for mentorship or anything of that sort.

Yeah, I feel my LinkedIn has been filled with a lot of messages on a weekly basis. I try to attend to so many people. A few days ago, I got a message from someone who schools in one institution in Bayelsa and he apparently reached out to me for career advice. He is currently studying computer science and he probably doesn’t really know which aspect of computer science to focus on. I even have a couple of templates that I tried to send to people to help people how well can try to navigate their careers. I know it’s a major issue in our country where most students out there in the university find it difficult to determine where they want to go. More or less self-discovery in what’s the next line of action. I feel that’s one thing that has kind of prompted me to look inward into how well I can mentor people and try to identify what exactly they want, what exactly they cherish, and what exactly will make them a better person in society.

You’re already making the step in the right direction by giving companies like us this kind of time because whatever we have recorded, and then we put out there would reach a lot of people at once, and then it will have maximum impact if I’m allowed to use that phrase. So thank you once again.

It’s my pleasure to give up my time to inspire the younger ones. I wish you and your team members the very best. It’s something I always try to appreciate when I see people trying to contribute their own quota to the growth of education in Nigeria. More success to your team.

Thank you so much. You too.