Performing Remote

Founder

PixMob

Director of Engineering

Nicolas Cava

I'm looking for a long-term relationship with a distributed SaaS business. I'm available right now for full-time permanent employment.

I can speak English or French and work from anywhere.

My expertise:

- Engineering management
- People management
- Strategic planning
- Project execution
- Systems and processes
- Distributed work
- Culture building
- Incident management
- Hiring and onboarding talents

Please connect with me and discuss how we can win together.

Engineering Manager

Zendesk

Zendesk is a large public enterprise with 5500+ employees distributed worldwide. The company is headquartered in San Francisco, California, US.

Industry: customer experience and instant messaging tech.

Responsible for:

→ Lead distributed software teams of up to 14 people.
→ Build core messaging capabilities for Zendesk products.
→ Contribute to the high-end conversational CX strategy.
→ Provide the API, conversation store, message routing, and orchestration pipeline.
→ Provide all the logic and integrations to operate in social channels.
→ Lead weekly tech talks.

Tech stack:

→ React
→ Node.js, Express, Ruby
→ MongoDB, Redis, DynamoDB, RabbitMQ, Kafka
→ Terraform, Istio, AWS
→ Spinnaker

PixMob was a bootstrapped company with 80+ employees distributed worldwide in the event industry. The company was headquartered in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

Industry: event management tech.

Responsible for:

→ Led the software engineering department composed of 10 employees across two continents.
→ Contributed to human-centric experiences, light shows, and corporate event activities.
→ Built edge computing, cloud computing, and high-availability data processing.
→ Built products on top of cutting-edge hardware infrastructure.
→ Supported decentralized authority and execution freedom.
→ Built an async-first culture with an emphasis on writing communication and documentation.
→ Organized 4-week development cycles with shaping, betting, and execution.
→ Provided individual development, coaching, and connections building.
→ Co-led a successful M&A by Bizzabo.

Tech stack:

→ React, React Native, Swift, Kotlin
→ Python
→ MongoDB, Redis, InfluxDB, Elasticsearch
→ Terraform, Nomad, Consul, Google Cloud
→ GitLab CI/CD

Swile

Swile was a VC-funded fintech startup (30M Series A, 70M Series B) with 300 employees distributed in France. The company was headquartered in Montpellier, France.

Industry: fintech.

Responsible for:

→ Led a distributed software team of 10 employees.
→ Built a B2B2C product with banking features, mobile, and web payments.
→ Built bank accounts, transfers, credit card management, and P2P payments.
→ Also built money pots, KYC and compliance, and charity donations.
→ Provided autonomy, ownership, decentralized authority, and execution freedom.
→ Built an async-first culture with a focus on written communication and documentation.
→ Provided individual development, coaching, and connections building.

Tech stack:

→ React, TypeScript, Kotlin, Swift
→ Ruby on Rails, Node.js, GraphQL
→ PostgreSQL, Kafka, Redis
→ AWS, Confluent
→ CircleCI, Bitrise

Swile was a VC-funded fintech startup (30M Series A, 70M Series B) with 300 employees distributed in France. The company was headquartered in Montpellier, France.

Industry: fintech.

Responsible for:

→ Member of a cross-functional and distributed software team.
→ Led a distributed team of 10 employees part-time.
→ Built a B2B2C product for employees and administrators in SMB and mid-market.
→ Built meal voucher credits, credit card orders, and employee management.
→ Also built onboarding, off-boarding, bank accounts, and credit card payments.

Tech stack:

→ React, JavaScript, TypeScript
→ Ruby on Rails
→ PostgreSQL, Redis
→ Heroku, AWS
→ Semaphore

Senior Software Engineer

Maple Inside

Maple Inside was a funded startup studio (2M seed) with 20 employees distributed worldwide. The company was headquartered in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada.

Industry: fintech and adtech.

Responsible for:

→ Co-founded the company with former colleagues.
→ Led a distributed team of 10 employees as head of product development.
→ Bootstrapped business ideas by building MVPs quickly to reach market pull.
→ Profitable products were incorporated into companies with hired founders.
→ Built products in the adtech, sharing economy, and fintech industries.
→ We grew the business to 1M ARR.
→ Had to close operations in 2018 as we consumed our runway.
→ A few companies emerged from the studio and are still in business.

Tech stack:

→ React, React Native, TypeScript
→ Node.js, GraphQL, Python
→ MySQL, Redis
→ AWS, Google Cloud
→ CircleCI

Co-Founder & CTO

PetalMD

PetalMD was a VC-funded healthtech startup with 100 employees distributed in Canada. The company was headquartered in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada.

Industry: healthtech.

Responsible for:

→ Member of a cross-functional software team.
→ Built a B2B product for physicians and healthcare facilities.
→ Also built online management, communication, and planning tools for physicians.

Tech stack:

→ JavaScript, CoffeeScript, Angular
→ Ruby on Rails
→ PostgreSQL, Redis, Elasticsearch, Pusher
→ Heroku
→ Jenkins

Crakmedia

Crakmedia was a bootstrapped adtech startup with 250 employees distributed in Canada. The company was headquartered in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada.

Industry: adtech.

Responsible for:

→ Led a front-end team of 10 employees.
→ Built an affiliate marketing platform supporting billions of daily hits.
→ Also built media buying, advertising platforms, traffic analytics, and offer management.
→ Also built big data processing and data science software.
→ Refactored a huge monolithic to a microservices architecture.
→ Provided individual development, coaching, and connections building.
→ Designed software architecture and technology strategies.
→ Led product analytics and application performance initiatives.

Tech stack:

→ JavaScript, TypeScript, React, Redux
→ Node.js, PHP, Symfony, Express
→ MySQL, Redis, Vertica
→ AWS
→ Bamboo

Front-end Technical Lead

I help remote leaders who are overwhelmed by their workload leave chaos by empowering people and improving self-discipline through the Performing Remote OS. | Fractional Engineering Leader, Coach

I'm a passionate people-first Engineering Manager with 12y+ of experience leading distributed teams for renowned SaaS businesses like Zendesk and Swile in AMER and EMEA.

I'm also a social entrepreneur who cares about positively impacting people and society. My personality type is ESTJ-A, and I'm a systems thinker with strong organizational and self-discipline skills.

My core values are contribution, growth, discipline, justice, transparency, and resilience. I'm also a father, gamer, remote work advocate, traveler, content creator, and developer, which I consider my identity stack.

My backstory is that I burned out in 2018, and remote work saved my life. Since then, I have strived to become the best remote leader I can be for my people and show that we can build exceptional distributed businesses by putting people first and providing opportunities for anyone from anywhere. I also share my journey in public with vulnerability and authenticity to help as many people as possible.

I post daily about remote leadership and personal development. I'm also building the Performing Remote OS, a system I use as a remote leader.

My credentials:

- 12+ years in distributed SaaS businesses in AMER and EMEA
- 10+ years as a successful leader of distributed engineering teams
- Dealt with 525% employee growth over 2 years
- Supervised 76 talents across 4 continents
- Co-founded and scaled a startup studio to 80K+ MRR in 3 years
- 94K+ paying customers in a B2B product
- Led a technical due diligence for a $13.5M M&A
- 6000+ workers supported in the Digital First Crew at Zendesk
- Led competitive virtual gaming teams of up to 40 individuals for 5 years
- 12+ years as a remote worker

Where to start:

- Follow me to receive my daily content
- Connect and DM me for more
- Book a free discovery call: https://www.nicolascava.com/discovery
- Send me an email: hello@nicolascava.com

Querio

Established early-stage technology team and SaaS data platform architecture for self-serve data analytics tooling powered by LLMs.

Skills: hiring, technical audit, technical strategy, technical debt management, architecture, systems design, vendor analysis, security optimisation, investor due diligence, tech recruitment, pair programming, refactoring, continuous delivery, code quality

Technologies: Next.js, Typescript, Python, Postgres, SQL, LLMs, OpenAI, Fivetran, AWS, Vercel, Inngest, Git

Interim Tech Lead

LandTech

Managing a team of 5.

Secured existing and new recurring revenue streams (multi-million ARR) with more efficient end-to-end data product delivery. Specifically, envisioned and guided the creation of a data platform to accelerate geospatial data integration, aligning strategy and delivery activities across multiple teams, resulting in a reduction of engineering effort to integrate new data sets from several weeks to several days. Formed and led one of the data platform teams in realising this vision by creating reusable abstractions and low-code data integration tooling.

Skills: platform architecture, systems design, data modelling, data warehousing, tech debt reduction, build vs. buy decisions, roadmaps (tech & delivery), risk management, stakeholder engagement, team formation, line management, mentoring, recruitment, DORA metrics, team documentation, pair programming, refactoring, continuous delivery, code quality, geospatial 

Technologies: AWS, Python, Typescript, SQL, Prefect, DBT, Pandas, Redshift, Postgres (PostGIS), Elasticsearch, Docker, Kubernetes, CDK, Cloudwatch, QGIS, Git

Lead Software Engineer - Data

MyTutor.co.uk

Initiated and led migration of an outsourced application to the in-house team, forming a pilot project to extract one domain out of a monolith and recruiting into the team. Particular focus on driving forward product quality, lowering lead time and increasing product delivery frequency using continuous delivery.

Skills: Insourcing, technical audit, tech strategy, technical debt management, domain-driven design, architecture, systems design, automated quality testing, stakeholder engagement, roadmaps, recruitment, mentoring, DORA metrics, pair programming, refactoring, continuous delivery, code quality

Technologies: Java, Javascript, SQL, Spring Boot, React, Postgres, AWS, Docker, Fargate, Cloudformation, Git, Microservices

Staff Software Engineer

Unruly

Enhanced scalability and performance of a core Adtech data analytics platform while progressively reducing technical debt. Built out a machine-learning platform to operationalise an ad optimisation model, aligning data requirements and architecture across multiple teams.

Skills: architecture, systems design, alignment activities, performance optimisation, technical debt management, pair programming, refactoring, continuous delivery, code quality

Technologies: Java, Python, Pandas, Scikit-learn, Flask, Airflow, Vectorwise, BigQuery, S3, Parquet, Athena, Vowpal Wabbit, GCP, AWS, Terraform, Git

Staff Software Engineer - Data

Enhancing a high-scale ad-tech demand-side platform, resolving critical technical debt and modularising a difficult-to-manage monolith. Engaged in cross-team activities to form alignment on core strategic architectural changes, including migration to a single sign-on platform for all users and extraction of a BI reporting tool from a non-scalable monolith.

Skills: technical debt management, performance optimisation, automated testing, domain-driven design, architecture, systems design, build vs. buy decisions, refactoring, recruitment, mentoring, pair programming, refactoring, continuous delivery, code quality

Technologies: Java, Javascript, SQL, Spring (Core, MVC, Security, Batch), Auth0, Redis, PostgreSQL, AWS (EC2), CloudFare CDN, Terraform, Puppet, CloudWatch, Git, Microservices

Staff Software Engineer - Demand Side

ANDigital

Managing a team of 5.

Headed an embedded consultative mobile app development team responsible for in-housing Costa Coffee’s mobile applications, aligned to Whitbread's technology processes and standards. Integrated the application to a new backend services architecture, alongside product feature development.

Lead Software Engineer

Euro Car Parks

Managing a team of 3.

Founding the engineering team for in-house development, developing core back-office applications and scalable data (ANPR camera) processing architecture.

Deloitte Digital

Managing a team of 7.

Led the first engagement team to build a minimum viable product of a consumer banking app for CYB Bank. Beyond this, served as the platform and architecture lead across several backend service teams.

Skills: client stakeholder engagement, architecture and systems design (platform, integration, services), technical alignment, DevOps automation, agile delivery, recruitment, line management, pair programming, refactoring, continuous delivery, code quality

Technologies: Java, SQL, Spring, Spring Batch, Elasticsearch, Apache Camel, Gradle, Jenkins, Ansible, Git

First Utility

Strategic solutions and technical architecture of a scalable platform for energy supply provisioning and customer journey workflow. Platform enabled further growth to achieve 200k customers milestone.

Skills: architecture (solutions and technical), systems design, cross-team technical alignment, domain-driven design, stakeholder engagement, prototyping, technical debt identification, pair programming, refactoring, continuous delivery, code quality, recruitment

Technologies: Java, Groovy, SQL, Spring, JMS, JPA/Hibernate, Apache Camel, Postgres, Cassandra,  Hadoop, Elasticsearch, Informatica, Vordel, JBoss, Tomcat, ActiveMQ, Maven, Jenkins, Git

Led a team to build a scalable backend and data integration system for energy supply provisioning. The platform supported immediate growth from 50k to 100k customers shortly after launch, enabling rapid scale of the company alongside the UK "Big 6" suppliers.

Atos

Led multiple high-scale backend and data development efforts for a key defence sector client, driving mission-critical projects.

Software Engineer

Hello there! My name is Vijay, and I'm a technical leader and experienced software engineer with over 15 years of experience. I have gained extensive skills and expertise in various industries and technology areas. 

▶ My next role
⭐ I'm currently searching ⭐ 

* Available: immediately
* Location: remote or West Midlands (onsite/hybrid) or London (limited hybrid)
* Possible roles: lead engineer, tech lead, engineering manager, senior engineer
* Specialities: backend, data
* Around 50% coding plus leadership activities

▶ Industries
Previous experience in:

* Prop-tech
* Ed-tech
* Ad-tech
* Banking
* Energy
* Defence

Within these, I've built SaaS and non-SaaS digital products for B2B and B2C, including mobile, web & data products. These have included SaaS companies with multi-million dollar recurring revenue, which I helped to scale.

▶ Roles
I have undertaken these roles:

* Software engineer - designed, built & delivered scalable backend & data systems
* Technical leader - business-aligned technical vision, strategy & architecture
* Engineering management - formed and managed high-performing teams
* Mentor & coach - developing others in formal and informal capacities

▶ Interest areas
1. Guiding teams using extensive experience.
2. Aligning technical strategy to business outcomes.
3. Removing unnecessary complexity.
4. Lean process and automation.
5. Driving quality where it matters.
6. Reciprocal mentoring.
7. Hands-on build!

▶ Values
My work ethic stems from: commitment, big-picture thinking, efficiency, adaptability, quality, empathy and collaboration.

▶ Leadership Skills
As a technology leader, I have developed a broad set of leadership skills alongside technical chops.

↗  People & team
* Stakeholder engagement
* Cross-team alignment
* Team structure
* Headcount planning
* Role design
* Hiring & onboarding
* Career matrices
* Career coaching & training
* Mentoring
* Performance management
* Succession planning
* Team health

↗ Delivery & process
* Lean mindset
* Continuous delivery & value streams
* Delivery planning & roadmaps
* Prioritisation
* Sequencing & slicing
* Risk management
* Documentation
* Facilitation
* Decision frameworks
* Metrics (e.g. DORA)
* Feedback loops
* DevOps processes
* Delivery quality
* TOIL reduction

↗  Technical
* Full technical audit
* Tech vision & strategy 
* Architecture
* Build vs. buy decisions
* Tech risk management e.g. debt
* Domain-driven design
* System design
* System quality
* Security & compliance
* System performance
* Dev/Data/MLOps 

Please connect if you share interests or think I could help you.

taplio

The Battle

Nicolas Cava

Vijay Patel

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