Day In The Life: Meet Prolific Interactive Engineer Dominic Ancrum

Dominic Ancrum
iOS Engineer, Prolific Interactive
Brooklyn, NY

8:20am: I’m greeted by the “Old Phone” alarm blaring from my iPhone. I silence it – along with the three other follow-up alarms I set to make sure I get up on time. I open up a few emails, including The Washington Post daily newsletter. I bookmark an interesting article to read later and jump in the shower. Once I get dressed and fix up my hair, I’m out the door.

9:00am: Commute time! I walk to the closest L train station, which is about eight minutes from my apartment. I read one of the Washington Post articles I bookmarked about how baseball players adjust their swing to hit the ball higher. I’m not a huge baseball fan, but the piece is fascinating.

9:50am: I hop off the train in Brooklyn and head to my office. I work at Prolific Interactive, a mobile-focused product agency. I love my work because I’m constantly learning, and I feel like I’m making a visible impact on the world around me.

10:00am: At my desk, I snack on a bag of roasted peanuts while checking my work email and Slack messages. My job as an iOS engineer is to develop applications for mobile devices that use Apple’s iOS operating system for Prolific’s partners (anyone from Saks Fifth Avenue to American Express). Today, I’m working on a project in Xcode – a MacOS application used to create apps for Apple’s various software platforms, including iOS.

10:15am: I join the rest of my product team (there are 13 of us) for morning stand-up, a daily meeting where each of us discuss what we’ve been working on, what we have planned for the day, and any general issues in development we need addressed. I give my updates and head over to ask our user interface designer about a product’s visual layout.

10:30am: Time for a quick check-in with the other engineer on my team. We run through what we’re each working on and anything we might need from one another. Back at my desk, I pull up Spotify on my phone, put my favorite R&B playlist on shuffle, and get to work. I’m building an interface which will allow users to view their saved store locations in a horizontally scrolling carousel and also deselect locations. Solving problems is a key part of my everyday duties and I really enjoy the feeling of triumph that comes with solving a particularly tricky one.

12:00pm: Our product team circles up for a Q&A session where we focus on a particular area of an app we’re working on. We actually try to “break it” in any way we can think of. This helps with discovering bugs, which can then be logged and prioritized.

12:30pm: It’s as good a time as any to grab lunch. There are a lot of delicious options around the neighborhood, and I’m all about rotating between a handful of favorites. I decide to grab some tacos at a great food truck on the corner of Jay Street and Water Street. Since it’s a nice day, I eat outside and scroll through Facebook and Instagram.

1:30pm: I meet with my product manager for our weekly one-on-one. We discuss the current state of the project I’m working on and address feedback I have. It’s important that I bring up any concerns I have as soon as possible so that my manager can address them in a timely manner.

2:00pm: It’s time for sprint planning – a meeting where our product team reviews the current state of a project, any component that may be unclear, and what we will be working on for the next week. I ask what should be prioritized (bug fixes or new features?) so I know what to work on next.

3:30pm: The other iOS engineer on my team sends a pull request for a bugfix. I put my headphones back on and get to work, testing the code and reading through any changes to fix one minor update before it’s merged into the codebase.

4:30pm: With the feature I’ve been working on finished, I request a review from my colleague. He calls out a potential issue with the changes I’ve made, so I fix it and update my request so that it can be put through our quality assurance check. As a general practice, we always test new features to identify and address any issues before we roll them out in the world.

6:00pm: I wrap up last-minute work, making sure to leave myself in a good place so I can pick back up easily in the morning. I check Slack and my emails to make sure nothing urgent requires my attention. All looks good, so I close up my laptop, pack my bag, and head out the door.

6:30pm: My friend and I meet up for dinner at Flor de Mayo, one of my favorite restaurants. I order their half chicken with a side of plain fried rice and salad. We enjoy a relaxing meal.

7:45pm: I go to the supermarket to grocery shop for the week. I also use this time to think through a couple programming projects I’m developing outside of work.

9:00pm: Time to work out. It’s leg day – the workout day I both love for its intensity and loathe for the same reason.

10:30pm: I get home and relax. It’s been a long day, physically and mentally, but also very fulfilling. I unwind by checking Facebook and Instagram and catching up on Insecure on HBO. I'm a big fan.

11:30pm: Time for my nightly routine. I head to bed and read any saved articles and stories I haven’t finished earlier in the day before drifting off to sleep.

Prolific Interactive is a Jopwell partner company

Images courtesy of Stetson Gleave