Barbara Martina Rodeker: Expressing The Multiple Facets of Her Mind

For Barbara Martina Rodeker, Computer Science was a problem to be solved more than a discipline to be learned. It was something strange, alien, and she wanted to understand it simply because she didn’t. In her own words, “In the beginning my interest in coding was more about trying out a kind of exotic area; it was more like a challenge. It wasn’t until later that I realized how good I feel when I tackle a complex problem, and hopefully solve it, but if not at least analyze and tame it.”

Barbara continued to be fascinated by code and went on to attend the Universidad Nacional del Centro de la Provincia de Buenos Aires where she earned a Degree Name Ing. de Sistemas. From there she launched a successful career as an iOS developer at a number of different organizations. However, there was a point when she had to stop and reevaluate her entire way of thinking, about thinking. She describes the process.

“I believed that many years of being dedicated to a particular technology stack or development language was the way to grow in my career. When I was at primary school, or even at University while doing my Bachelor in Computer Sciences, I never received an education about how our minds and brains work, and how we can take them to their full potential just by following some principles, practices and changing our habits, those small habits we all have and we think are kind of ‘fixed’, pre-programmed in our ROM.”

“I was lucky enough to be able to dedicate some time to myself, during which I discovered many stories and resources that made me change my mind about the potential we have. One of these resources is the top #1 MOOC of the last 50 years, ‘Learning How to Learn.’ There I discovered concepts such as Impostor Syndrome, Procrastination, Memory Palace, Einstellung, Transfer, and read stories from many people in many different fields about how they reinvented themselves and their careers.”

“Now I strongly believe and encourage people to step outside of their comfort zone and explore new things, new areas in their work, new programming languages, new stacks, new IDEs, new tools and new practices for their team. Give yourself the chance and be kind to yourself in the process.”

During her career, Barbara has also found help and support through the members of her local Women Who Code Network. She describes her experience with the organization, “I first heard about WWCode from the Meetup group being run in Berlin, Germany. I was happy to be living in this city, especially since it allowed me to meet one of the WWCode Directors, thanks Aleksandra!. She really encouraged me to start taking part in the meetings and I'm very glad I did. I've met interesting people and the talks are always of a really good quality. And the latest talks have piqued a new interest in me: learning Javascript.”

Today Barbara works as a Senior iOS Developer at Komoot, which she describes as, “a place where you can feel happy about what you're doing and how you're doing it, while creating a community and having good relationships with your partners. At the same time, you have the freedom to express multiple facets of yourself, and have a daily impact.”

She also continues to be fascinated by the innovations of the industry, and she described her enthusiasm for working in this area, “The incredible booming of technologies in different fields of our lives, and the possibility of always learning something new, mixed with the international exposition of ideas and opportunities that software opens to you is what excites me more than anything else about my career.”

Outside of her day job Barbara works to improve the world around her, having served as an ad honorem teaching assistant during her years at University, and mentoring developers in the companies she’s worked for. She’s also a volunteer developer for Share the Meal, a website and mobile platform that allows people to donate in order to help end world hunger. In the future she’d like to pursue a PhD or MS and research further into the intersection between technology and health.