Tech enthusiasts and professionals need to cultivate a habit of documenting their work to utilise opportunities for career growth, globally. This sentiment was echoed and advised by Bade Adesemowo, Co-founder and Chief Technology Officer of Social Lender.
Adesemowo, speaking as part of the Visa Alumni Panel at the recently held Tech Nation Visa Report Launch in London, explained that this attribute was particularly necessary for professionals in the tech ecosystem looking to migrate to the UK through the efficient Tech Nation Visa to advance their skills and careers.
Speaking on the importance of documentation and the shortfall a lack of it represents for applicants looking to take advantage of the organisation’s global talent visa, Adesemowo pointed out that “many of the things people in tech fall prey to, is that we don’t hype ourselves enough; we don’t talk about the things that we’ve done and we don’t document those things.”
He further advised tech professionals and applicants to start building their local ecosystem, because that’s what Tech Nation are looking at to determine the likelihood that tech professionals would replicate the things they have done in the past if given the opportunity to migrate.
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The fintech startup innovator is one of 50 Visa holders and alumni featured in Tech Nation’s inaugural ‘Faces of Visa’ honorarium, having moved to expand Social Lender in the UK after achieving outstanding growth in Lagos, Nigeria’s economic capital.
Adesemowo, on the panel discussion that consisted of other tech professionals such as John Winfield – Global Talent Visa Lead, Tech Nation; Devon Geary – Network & Partnerships Manager, Innovation Alliance; Lyubov Guk – Founding Partner, Blue Lake VC; and Herman Komashko – Principal Engineer, Safeguard Global, also gave insights into his company’s decision to establish an outlet outside the shores of Nigeria.
While stating an ambitious desire to spread Social Lender’s tentacles across the globe, the company’s CTO explained that the UK was chosen amongst the options available to his team due to its rapidly growing tech ecosystem and proximity to their home ecosystem. The flexible Global Talent Visa presented opportunities for international talents to continue growing their local ecosystem while also expanding internationally.
He said, “We are Africa-focused but we also want to be able to do other things in the West. One reason was because of the FCA sandbox which for us as a fintech company is a way to be able to experiment with our solution now in the UK,” adding that the UK is “creating an avenue in terms of making a good landing pad — from investments, SEIS and EIS, and the frameworks that are available.”
Adesemowo further encouraged tech professionals across numerous disciplines and grade levels in the ecosystem to also consider the UK as a destination, revealing that there are various support channels to help guide applicants for the global talent visa on the process and requirements, as well as solutions around settlement and procurement of Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR) documents.
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