About Iris Ibekwe
Iris joined CivicActions as an Engineer in 2014. She leverages her creativity and design skills to create compelling, standards-compliant themes. Passionate about the evolving web and design impact across various devices, Iris creates future-proof websites with OOCSS, lean markup, flexible grids and device-agnostic design principles.
Iris is a front-end developer with skills in HTML5, CSS3, Javascript & JQuery. She is skilled in Drupal theming and configuration and is adept in juggling between using cutting edge development techniques and ensuring graceful degradation for older browsers.
Before joining CivicActions, Iris was an independent contractor collaborating with clients to engineer website projects from initial concept to final product launch and maintenance. With her strict attention to detail and high coding standards, she established a powerful online web presence for each client using baked-in SEO techniques and semantic, 508-compliant code.
Iris earned her bachelors degree in Electronic Engineering from the University of Nigeria. Once you coax her away from her computer, she enjoys exploring the beautiful Virginia countryside, discovering hidden treasure in remote antique stores and visiting local farmers’ markets. She enjoys African cuisine, loves to travel and is also a skillful seamstress.
Q&A
What do you do at CivicActions?
I am a Front-End developer.
I work on Drupal theming, champion accessibility practices, mobile development, general Drupal site-building and a bit of Wordpress development. In my role as one of the practice leads for front-end development, I’m usually on the lookout for the latest advances in front-end techniques and test them for possible adoption into our development workflow.
What tools do you use most often?
- Terminal
- IDE: PHPStorm
- Apps: Slack, Trello
What do you love most about CivicActions?
It is difficult to put a finger on the thing I love most about CivicActions.
I love the openness, the collaborative atmosphere, the honesty, and the way CivicActions prioritizes the well-being of team members.
The flexibility and the way team members are trusted to put forth their best effort and meet their work goals without any form of micro-management is absolutely encouraging. I love the way tough conversations are encouraged and worked through, dissenting opinions are aired in an atmosphere of respect and a willingness to understand other people’s points of view.
CivicActions is particularly special to me because at a point where new mothers are pressured to choose between taking care of a new baby and continuing with their career, CivicActions made it possible for me to have my cake and eat it, too.
What do you love about what you do?
I love working with Drupal.
It is quite flexible and gives one the ability to build a wide range of websites for different purposes, all with open source tools. I also enjoy working with front-end technologies as a whole. I’m looking forward to where the industry is going and the future, exciting possibilities in store for Javascript and Drupal.
Engineer