Meet Ntokozo Jiyana

Testing the limits, exploring the possibilities, creating a new reality for online payments. Who do these words fit? A mad scientist? No, these are actually three attributes of the exceptional engineering team at Peach Payments responsible for helping us revolutionise payments in Africa.

Meet Ntokozo Jiyana, our Devops Engineer. 

How did you get started in tech?
I enrolled in a computer systems diploma course at Vaal University of Technology. This course gave me a foundation and broadened my knowledge of computer science. After I completed the course, I started an internship programme with Datacentrix, where I got exposure to different systems like Novel. During this period, I learned SUSE Linux and Novel Netware. I went on to do my Linux certifications like CLA (Suse), RHCSA (Redhat), RHCE (Redhat), and HP EVA storage. As a system administrator at the time, I was able to broaden my knowledge of Linux, storage, and hardware systems by embarking on this journey.I eventually began working on HPC clusters with organisations such as CHPC, the University of Pretoria, and the South African Weather Service.After working as a system administrator for many years, I decided to become a Devops Engineer.I worked for financial institutions for a long time before I ended up at Peach Payments.

What do you love most about your role?
It will be about collaboration and enabling engineers to efficiently carry out their objectives and those of the business. The ever-changing tech stack and getting my hands dirty using the tools keep me on my toes because there is always something new to learn. I also learn a lot from my teammates, and in turn, I try to impart my knowledge for the betterment of the team.

What advice would you give others who are starting out in your field?
DevOps keeps changing every second day. You need to get the fundamentals right and make sure the foundation of the tools you learn is solid. Start by getting your Linux, Python, or Bash containers and cloud services.

What skills have helped you succeed at Peach Payments?
As a devops engineer, you get your hands in almost everything. So one important attribute would be being a team player. We have to do a lot of collaboration with other teams and individuals, so interacting and establishing good relationships is a prerequisite.

Be open to learning, working independently, and ensuring your teammates are kept in the loop on the tasks at hand. 

AWS cloud administration, bash, IaC (Terraform), configuration management (Ansible), observability. These are a few tools we utilise and that have made my work life easier.

What excites you most about working in the payments space?
Getting exposure to different projects and payment services. It's one thing to see and use an app on the front end, but getting into the nitty-gritty of how everything fits together is a thrilling feeling. So being a part of a team that develops payment systems brings me great joy.

If you were a superhero, what would your superpower and superhero name be?
For sure, Iron Man. His suit of armour gives him extraordinary strength and durability, as well as flying and a huge selection of weapons.

What new skill (technical / non-technical) are you hoping to learn next? 
Technical: Vault secrets manager. Cloud Security. Advance python.

Non Technical: Leadership.