My sister lives in Rochester, MN. IBM “had” a campus there where the AS 400 was developed. Employed about 35,000 people. One day, they shipped the jobs to Mexico and laid off people. It devastated the town. I am no longer as keen on massive and dominant African tech companies.

While tech companies may build innovative products, that could create and open up new markets, they are notoriously ruthless at cutting jobs to survive. This is why I loved the thread by @tobi the Shopify CEO so much. It is a different philosophy entirely which we must learn.

What happened in Rochester also happened to “technical” companies in the oil and gas sector in Nigeria too. I once said that tech people in Nigeria currently remind me of the era we once went through with oil and gas. The time I once fired 21 people before New Year is coming.

Optimizations are inevitable in the tech once valuation targets by investors are met. Jumia and Andela layoffs are child’s play compared to what is possible. That is why I was laughing to myself yesterday when @docolumide and @JasonNjoku were talking about the <$250m chasm.

Once companies hit a certain milestone after rapid growth, they look back to now start clawing for profit or at least acceptable losses. I am more in favor of creating jobs outside the company than inside it as I know that the inside jobs are the first casualty in optimizations.

Just read a tweet putting working in tech as part of 2020 goals. It is important to have a long term vision of your career when you decide. There are so many people I talk to who don’t think beyond a year. I never made that mistake. Swifta’s slogan is “in touch with the future.”