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George Botsev on Why Remote Work is the Superior Way of Working

December 13, 2021

Dario Jazbec Hrvatin

Our Star of the Month, George Botsev, talks about debugging user issues and working remotely from a village.

Tell us a bit about yourself

Here is me and my family. My wife and our two dogs. That day we did a walk around the fields near our house.

George and his wife Detelina walking their dogs

What were you doing before joining OTGS?

System administration and support of business processes for a payment company. I was also doing freelance work – developing various sites – including multilingual sites.

How did you hear about the company? When did you join?

In my hobby and freelance work, I was using WordPress, so I knew of ways to internationalize and localize WordPress and WPML was and is the obvious choice now as well as back then.

I joined the team in September 2014.

This is me outside of our house where we moved more than a year ago. Then we finally got our grass in the yard.

George Botsev outside of the house in the nature

Tell us more about your hobbies, pets, and how you spend your weekends

In my free time, also like in my non-free time, I like to listen to music, and this can be seen by what I shared in our company’s “Music” channel on Mattermost (chat service we use).

Many people know about my weird sense of humor and that I like to share things that I consider funny – this can be seen in our “Water Cooler” Mattermost channel… Also see below:

Here is one of my “paintings” from my “Green” period:

George’s painting from his “Green period”

I enjoy taking pictures of various places and things. Here is a selfie of me wearing a mask (I bet you can recognize me without the mask, but not with the mask this is why I am explaining what you see :D ) in a museum of aquatics in the underwater section:

George in the Museum of Aquatics

Could you describe your job at OnTheGoSystems?

Now so – you deploy a user package locally, open it as a website, open PhpStorm, click around and press F8 and F9 until something makes sense :)

What qualifications are needed to do your job well?

Common sense and some PHP knowledge.

Which teams or team members do you work closely with?

I work with the whole support team. Whether it is on P2 (our internal website for supporters), Mattermost, or YouTrack (our project management system), when they have an issue and they need assistance I am striving to provide the best answer possible.

What’s the most challenging part of your job, and how do you overcome it?

Every separate case has its challenges. It depends on the case. Everything can be overcome eventually given enough time, coffee, and attention.

George Botsev: Living now in a village has its perks – you can get some mushrooms and they are pretty tasty when cooked and when not poisonous :D

What’s a typical day like for you?

What I do daily is to check the tickets – both 1st and 2nd tier tickets and prioritize what I see as most important to debug.

If something depends on me (i.e. feedback is needed from me) it has a larger priority than existing issues as it is probably blocking someone, so I try to handle that first. So, then I debug and pass it to developers if it requires their attention.

In your experience, what are the best things and most challenging things about working remotely?

In my opinion, remote working is the superior way of working.

Any hopes and plans for the future (personal or professional)?

Currently, I am studying at University for my bachelor’s degree. With my wife, we are trying to have a baby.

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