JO

James Okonkwo

author

Serial startup engineer with 3 successful exits under his belt. James has been employee #1-10 at multiple companies and specializes in making pragmatic tech decisions that actually ship products.

3 articles

Articles by James Okonkwo

How I Actually Organize Technical Knowledge (After Failing with Notion Databases)
technology

How I Actually Organize Technical Knowledge (After Failing with Notion Databases)

I went from 2,000+ unorganized bookmarks to a queryable knowledge system. Here's the modified Zettelkasten structure that actually works for code.

JOJames OkonkwoSeptember 4, 202510 min read
Staff Engineer vs. EM: What My Calendar Actually Looked Like in Both Roles
technology

Staff Engineer vs. EM: What My Calendar Actually Looked Like in Both Roles

I tracked my calendar in both roles. The coding time difference isn't what you'd expect, but one question in my 5-point framework made the choice obvious.

JOJames OkonkwoJune 10, 202510 min read
Why I Kept Going Back to Obsidian for Debugging Journals (But Not for Everything)
technology

Why I Kept Going Back to Obsidian for Debugging Journals (But Not for Everything)

After 6 months tracking 12 metrics across both apps, the winner came down to one question most comparisons ignore. Spoiler: capture time dropped from 12s to 4s.

JOJames OkonkwoMarch 16, 20258 min read
James Okonkwo | Blog Core