The Ultimate Guide in Building a Legacy:

A Glimpse in the Life of a Computer Engineer, Adil Mezghouti

“My goal in life is to leave a legacy, to leave an impact… to benefit people,” expressed Adil Mezghouti. These wise words allowed me to look at computer engineering in a new light. Adil Mezghouti currently is a computer engineer consultant for J. Crew Group, Inc. located in NYC, NY. I had the opportunity of sitting down with Mr. Mezghouti for an interview, that a mutual friend had set up, in a local youth center in Brooklyn, NY. Adil Mezghouti allowed me to come to the conclusion that computer engineering is a career with no limitations or boundaries.

Growing up, Mezghouti always knew the importance in education. His father always told him, “The best investment you can do is in education.” He was introduced to engineering by his older brother, who was an agricultural engineer. “As you grow up, you are always looking for someone you can imitate,” mentions Mezghouti. For him it was his brother, he would read all his brothers textbooks. Mezghouti entered two colleges in Fez, Morocco and failed since those studies were not his passion. Then he transferred to a private university named EPSIEL located in Fez, Morocco where he obtained a bachelor’s degree in computer science in 2002. He was taught industrial computing, which was computer science applied for robotics. He mentions an anecdote from his first computer science class. His teacher has asked him to turn on the computer that was in front of him and he did not know how to. His embarrassment of not being able to complete the simple task had given him the motivation to study everything about computer science. After receiving his bachelor’s, Mezghouti moved to America and in 2011 he received his Master’s in computer science from Northeastern Illinois University located in Chicago, IL. He is currently working online towards his PHD from Aspen University.

Adil Mezghouti has gain years of experience, he has been working as a computer engineer since 2006. Although he could not recall the name of the company for his first job, he mentioned it was a small company located in Casablanca, Morocco. He was a technician, he fixed computers and developed software. Over the past twelve years, Mezghouti has worked with many companies as a developer or technician. Some of these companies included US Bank, Clean Urban Energy Inc., American Express, and Verizon Wireless. He currently works as a computer engineer consultant for J. Crew Group Inc. located in New York City, NY. He works with different clients to fulfill their needs. Mezghouti describes working at J. Crew Group Inc. as exciting and challenging, he reveals that, “When the project is challenging you look forward to working on it… it is like a puzzle, it is like a game, it is a never-ending game.”

Mezghouti discloses that work starts at 10:00 am but he tries to go in around 7:30 am to study beforehand. The first thing he does every day is a concept called scram. Everyone on the team gets together and states their status reports. They mention what they did the day before, any problems and what they are going to do today. After scram, the project manager takes the project of the day and breaks it into individual tasks for the team to work on. His tasks usually include working on developing and implementing the tasks. His day is 90% on a computer, writing code and solving problems and 10% communicating with team members discussing the tasks. Since his position is a consultant, he sometimes travels to the areas that need consulting.  His day usually ends around 5pm or 8pm depending on the task of the day.

Writing is a major importance in Mezghouti’s job. He writes emails daily and writes around 7 emails a week. He states emails are the recommended way to communicate with colleagues. He mentions, “After years of working as an engineer, if you want to leave a legacy, you need to find a way to let people know what you know and what your capable of” to build a reputation, you need to build a presence and that is through writing blogs and articles. “As human beings you do not know someone until you communicate with someone,” he states, and the only way to communicate online is through writing. Mezghouti reads daily to be up to date with technology. He reads Medium, Wired, and Harvard Business. He also mentions that communication is crucial in a team environment. He communicates in meetings with the team and vendors to discuss projects. He communicates when presenting frameworks and solutions to the team, which he does annually. Communication skills will create trust in your findings.

Adil Mezghouti’s biggest advice was to look at the way you approach failure. “In engineering, they always say fail fast and fail often,” he states. If you reflect on your life, it is all experiences that are gathered through failures. He uses the analogy of learning how to walk, you fall often until you finally learn to walk. One must embrace those failure to learn from them. Another advice was to build on your personality. He reveals that you must reflect on yourself and work on your own weaknesses. This will allow you to maximize your opportunity to confidently talk to any individual. Your personality can be the factor in whether you gain a client or not.

Listening to Adil Mezghouti’s advice and aspirations allowed me to realize that computer engineering is a career that will allow me to prosper in ways I never imagined and will allow me to leave my mark in the world. If you expand your knowledge through reading, writing, and communication you can leave your legacy. You can show the work what you know and how it can change the world. Adil Mezghouti showed me the sky’s not the limit.