About me
Let me tell you my story
Most kids during my childhood dreamed of becoming pilots, doctors, firefighters. Well, I didn't know what I want to be when I grow up until the first time I sat down in front of a computer. Although I may not have known the exact name of my future calling at that time, from that point on, there was never a doubt in my mind that I want to be a Software Engineer.
On my hunt for knowledge, inside and outside of school and university, my focus was on technology. Only after I started working in the industry, I truly came to the realization that creating software is about much more than just technology. It's about people. It's about value. It's about making a world a better place - no matter how cheesy that sounds. Technology is just a mean to a goal.
Passionate engineers very often get centered on technology, loosing sight of that goal. However, passionate engineers are what makes today's world turn. Taking that passion and directing it toward achieving the desired goal is what creates world-changing software. This is what leading engineers is all about. This is what I do.
OK, enough of work. Here are a few facts about me. I'm 33 years old most of which I spent building software. I'm happily married for 9 years and, I'm a proud cat-dad 😸. I'm originally from Bosnia and Herzegovina. I speak fluent German and English. I'm a space exploration enthusiast. I enjoy gardening as therapy. I like building things with my hands like rocket models and doing woodwork (amateur level).
Experience
What I have been doing so far
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March 2015 - December 2020
CELUM - Software Engineer
As a Software Engineer at CELUM, together with my team, I was responsible for the implementation of new and maintenance of existing components. I mainly worked on CELUM's core product which at that time was in its second decade of development, consists of around half a million lines of code and has around a million of users. During this time I also worked on many other products/projects and gained a working experience with a wide range of technologies. I took part in the design and implementation of CELUM's hybrid cloud solution, which integrates all of CELUM's and many 3rd party products, running in the cloud and on premise. This gave me the opportunity to gain architectural experience on a very high level.
Besides regular Java development, I started and lead the initiative to improve the CI/CD capabilities of CELUM's core product. This included the migration from SVN to Git, migration from Jenkins to Azure Devops and full deployment automation using the Azure Cloud. Before this, development and operations at CELUM was completely separated into 2 different departments. These improvements created a DevOps culture, brought dev and ops much closer together and drastically improved the product delivery speed and quality.
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January 2021 - August 2024
CELUM - Software Architect
After almost six years at CELUM, I was elevated to the position of Architect in my team. In this role, I was responsible for the long-term technical strategy of the product as well as the day-to-day operations within my team. This included the preparation of technical concepts for new features, coordination and alignment with architects of other teams, mentoring of and providing guidance and support to team members, interviewing candidates, onboarding of new team members, supporting the PO with planning and organization, etc.
Being an architect was not only a technical role at CELUM but had a big organizational and leadership element to it. This was reflected in my active involvement in interdepartmental and cross-departmental structural changes within the company. I also conducted around 100 interviews with candidates for Developer, DevOps, Cloud Engineer and PO positions and onboarded more than 15 new-joiners.
During this time, I was heavily involved in integrating all of CELUM's services into one coherent platform. I have also designed the public REST API for CELUM's core product and implemented it together with my team - the development of which took more than 2 years and replaced multiple legacy APIs. In parallel to all of that, me and my team implemented an internal analytics platform that today helps CELUM make better decision based on a data driven approach.
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September 2024 - Present
CELUM - Technical Lead
As a natural direction that I was heading into, I was promoted to the position of Technical Lead in my team. This extended my role to a more organizational and leadership oriented one, while keeping a strong engineering focus. The additional responsibilities include participating in long-term planning decisions, making sure to achieve long term goals and objectives, keeping agreed upon deadlines and quality standards and being the main point of contact for all technical topics within and beyond team boundaries.
A crucial part of my work lately is finding the most optimal use of AI tools in the software development process. While AI carries huge potentials, it also brings many challenges and risks. My goal is to find a balance between maximizing the output while keeping engineers in control of the process, assuring maintainability and the quality of the product.
Out of all the achievements, there are some that I want to highlight. My team has delivered the first AI powered feature at CELUM. We have empowered our customers and partners with many capabilities to extend and integrate our product into their landscapes. While being only one fifth of our product engineering force, we maintain two thirds of all the product code and keep it up to date. We support multiple versions of our product with multiple releases per month which are rolled out automatically and reliably to hundreds of customers, hundreds of thousands of users all around the world. We do all of that while delivering great features on time, every time.
Tech Stack
These are my technical skills
Soft Skills
My character traits and interpersonal skills
Leadership
Teamwork
Problem-Solving
Organization
Time Management
Communication
Education
Scientia potentia est
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October 2012 - June 2020
Johannes Kepler University Linz - Computer Sciences BSc
My bachelor thesis demonstrates, practically and theoretically, how non-blocking IO and reactive programming can be used to build a hybrid and high-throughput storage solution. The thesis is based on the implementation of CELUM's Storage Service. The Storage Service is based on the Vert.x Toolkit and RxJava Framework.
After starting my career in Software Development in 2015, I continued studying part-time. While I passed all my exams in 2020, my bachelor thesis was handed in and accepted by the university in 2025 when I also finally graduated.