Monzo Staff Weekly Q&A - Kieran McHugh (Backend Engineer)


Note : All Monzo Q&As to date can be found here :grinning:


People, all over the world and the known universe!
Come gather, for we are living in a truly remarkable time. One where all the questions you want to ask, can be answered. One where all your wildest dreams might come true. Are you tuned in? Are you sitting comfortably? Are you experienced?

That’s right - it’s the Monzo Staff Weekly Q&A! We won’t stop cuz we can’t stop.

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But first, you better be up to speed. Check out all previous Q&As below!


Week 1 : Chris MacLean, Customer Operations & Vulnerable Customers :santa:t2:
Week 2 : James Nicholson, iOS Engineer :green_apple:
Week 3 : Tara Mansfield, People Operations Manager :woman_technologist:t5::man_technologist:t3:
Week 4 : James Routley, Backend Engineer :hammer_and_wrench:
Week 5 : Hugh Wells, Customer Operations :policeman:t3:‍♂
Week 6 : Naz Malik, Technical Specialist :computer:
Week 7 : Fred Morgan, COps Squad Captain (Calls & Social Media) :telephone_receiver:
Week 8 : Emma Northcott, COps Scaling Team :balance_scale:
Week 9 : Jarno Wolf, COps Financial Crime Specialist & Squad Captain :wolf:
Week 10 : Maria Campbell, Head of People :woman_office_worker:t2::man_office_worker:t4:
Week 11 : Jim Amey, Night COps Captain :bat: :crescent_moon:
Week 12 : Richard Cook, Online Community Manager :man_cook:
Week 13 : Beatrice Borbon, Content & Press Manager :newspaper:
Week 14 : Tom Blomfield, CEO :crown:
Week 15 : Ella Johanny, COps/Hiring :handshake:
Week 16 : Harry Ashbridge, Writer :writing_hand:t3:
Week 17 : Beth Scott, Overnight COps :cat2:
Week 18 : Georgie Parmenter, Executive Assistant to the Founders :blonde_woman:
Week 19 : Vulnerable Customers Team :sunflower:
Week 20 : Leah Templeman, Interim VP People :sun_with_face:
Week 21 : Daniel Chatfield, Backend Engineer, Fincrime & Security :closed_lock_with_key:
Week 22 : Valerio Magliulo, Product Manager - Revenue Team :money_with_wings:
Week 23 : Sam Watkin, Operations Analyst :thinking:


This week, the Hot Coral Hot Seat™️ belongs to… Kieran McHugh, Backend Engineer! (@kieranmch)

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Kieran recently was part of the team building IFTTT support for Monzo, which has now launched and is awesome! He’s now working on building product features around Monzo With Friends.

Fun fact about Kieran, he’s played piano since he was 7! :musical_keyboard:

His favourite thing about working for Monzo?

“Being the least intelligent engineer in the company and being able to learn so much from others :slight_smile:”

(his own words, just for the record!!!)

Alright folks, you know how this works. Questions in! Kieran will be here later in the week to answer them!

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ib4 Cats and Pineapple

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Hey Kieran :wave:,

I play the piano too! Do you just play for fun or have you done any grades? :musical_keyboard: What’s your favorite piece to play? :slightly_smiling_face:

What programming languages do you know other than Go? :question:

What IDE do you use and are there any other dev tools you couldn’t live without? :computer:

What feature are you most excited about Monzo releasing in the future? :monzo:

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If you could use ifttt to link up two parts of your life to make it better and easier what would they be ?!

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How are you always so modest? You’re an example to us all! :raised_hands:

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In the event of a zombie apocalypse, what would your weapon of choice be?

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What’s the future Monzo feature that you are most looking forward to?

Do you find the strong imperative focus in Go to be limiting or frustrating? Context - I’m about to start a job involving Go but I generally find functional solutions more intuitive and composable

Edit: something something pineapple :pineapple: cats :cat2: :cat2:

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how hard / easy was it to get approval for spending extra time on IFTTT after the initial “monzo day” (??) and does it get put to a ( management ? ) vote or one person decide yes run with this ?

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Are you working in any other exciting projects that aren’t on the monzo product roadmap?

I won’t tell anyone, promise!

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From what I know, Monzo is the first bank to link up with IFTTT. How does it feel to be on the forefront of making banking relevant for the modern age?

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You boarded the Mechanical Keyboard hype train?, Also as a developer looking at learning go do you have any recommended resources?

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If you were given the opportunity to draft a development roadmap of Monzo features/imrpvements/etc (tech debt?) on which you would be working on for the next 12 months, what would that roadmap roughly look like?

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Isn’t that what this is?

That’s the official roadmap, but my question relates to personal priorities.

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Does this include fixing the problem with bill splitting whereby Monzo.me bill splits are not reflected properly in targets/summary spending?

Also, just curious as to what makes you say you’re the “least intelligent engineer”? Apart from modesty, is it to do with anything such as formal education level, qualifications, university, work experience, age, etc.

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Which integration would you most like to see next?

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Hi Kieran.

I remember you saying on here earlier in the year you were stepping up from forum-goer to Monzo graduate intern, and on Twitter you very recently wrote that you had passed your probation and are now a fully-fledged member of the Monzo team.

Firstly, on behalf of the hundreds of forum-goers who would love to be a part of the team but don’t have the talent, motivation or the right circumstances to follow that dream… Massive congratulations! :pizza::heart_eyes_cat:

How did you ‘sell yourself’ to Monzo to get in the door and into such a crucial position at such a young age? Do you have a really top degree and loads of demonstrable experience in the field or did you persuade them to hire you based on your ideas etc? Maybe you knew the team personally from hackathons or meet ups?

Would be interesting to know how you suddenly went from Clark Kent to Superman in a matter of months. :sunglasses:

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Great questions all! Last chance saloon … Kieran will be here soon to answer! :raised_hands:

How did you get into programming / has it been something you’ve been interested in from a young age or is it a more recent development?

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