BAIT Experts in Germany

• Head of the group-wide, international, and cross-functional IT Governance & IAM department within the central IT division of a large French-German private banking group. Disciplinary management of around 30 employees at five different locations within the group (Frankfurt, Paris, Tunis, Saarbrücken, Düsseldorf). Head of IT committees and key role in direct communication with management, the supervisory board, external stakeholders, and regulators.
• Definition and establishment of a state-of-the-art IT strategy process and related IT governance structures for the group's IT department with more than 600 employees (testified by the German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority and the ACPR) and successful process run.
• Establishment of a new future-oriented process framework for IT and necessary governance structures (process squads) for the continuous improvement of IT processes with regard to new regulatory requirements (including DORA, EU AI Act, etc.).
• Establishment of stringent processes to close a historical backlog of findings (> 100 IT findings, 40 overdue findings in 2022) from internal and external auditors (WP, ACPR, BaFin). Successful reduction of stock of overdue findings to 0 at the end of 2025.
• Supporting more than 20 IT audits per year and establishment of regulatory monitoring processes. Introduction of ServiceNow to revolutionize regulatory change and IT compliance processes with advanced AI functionalities.
• Realignment of IT control processes in conjunction with the newly established ICT risk function under DORA and the three lines of defense concept using the TopEase GRC solution.
• Reduction of the application landscape, by systematically analysing the purpose with application and business owners, identifying duplicates while implementing a One-Tool Strategy throughout the group. Successful reduction of one third of the application landscape within the CMDB.
• Onboarding of all group applications into One Identity's group-wide IAM solution, as well as operation and further development of the solution in connection with segregation of duties (SoD), role-based access management (RBAC), etc.

• Capturing the current processes Incident Management, IT Service Request Management, Problem Management, Change Management, Service Configuration Management (including CMDB)
• Carrying out maturity assessments for these processes based on the ITIL® 4 Maturity Model
• Analyzing the different service value streams based on the ITIL® 4 value stream model
• Agreeing maturity levels for the processes being reviewed
• Developing and approving a roadmap to achieve and measure the respective maturity levels
• Presenting the approach, including milestones, to management for approval
• Managing external service providers in 1st level support

2nd LoD/Change the Bank (CtB)

• CtB: External consultant and workstream lead for rectifying findings by BaFin following a special IT audit in the 2nd LoD, management of the work package for revising the ICT Risk Management & ICT Asset Classification in accordance with DORA Chapter 2, the processes for structural analysis, protection requirements, and control assessments (4 FTEs).

Industry: Publishing, media Project management for the concept of a RAG-based archive access solution: a secure on-prem or hybrid compute architecture for LLM and embedding operations, pipeline for transcription and automatic tagging, semantic search across audio and video archives. Use case evaluation and make-or-buy together with editorial team, archive, and legal department, taking into account copyright, broadcasting law, and the AI Act. Differentiator: practical LLM infrastructure experience from two own productive platforms combined with C-level program management in regulated industries.

• Technical leadership and further development of a team of 28 IT staff (internal & external) in the areas HelpDesk/HelpLine, RHEL (Red Hat), MUREX (trading system & applications), SAP basis operations
• Managing external service providers (including FI-TS for SAP basis operations)
• Personnel, resource and budget planning for the IT department and projects
• Introducing and establishing regular communication formats (weekly status meetings, team and cross-department meetings)
• Ensuring application operations in a hybrid environment (Windows/Linux with database and web/application servers)
• Supporting transformation projects to modernize the application landscape (e.g. DevOps approaches)
• Setting up and implementing a digital IT procurement for hardware & software (e.g. with DELL)
• Developing and managing the "IT Operations DOS" department based on corporate strategy
• Preparing management reports & decision papers on IT projects, optimization potential and automation opportunities
• Representing the department in the advisory boards of the Rentenbank and ensuring regulatory compliance (BaFin §44, GDPR, BSI, MaRisk)

• Regulated environment within a German banking group (approx. 8,500 employees, hybrid cloud strategy).

• Responsible for operating, provisioning, and continuously securing business-critical platforms – including a GenAI chat application, a big data/AI platform, and data science workspaces based on Azure Virtual Desktops and VMs. Ownership of Azure DevOps projects for ShaiHulud and React2Shell, as well as BSI alerts – Security Operations improvements across the SDLC.

• Deployment responsibility for the GenAI chat application, big data/AI platform (BDAI), and data science workspaces (AVD/VM-based) in the respective landing zones.

• Deployment & release management: end-to-end responsibility for deploying portal and service applications across multiple Azure landing zones, including technical approvals, compliance with development team deployment guidelines, and ensuring ITIL-based change and release processes via ServiceNow.

• Azure landing zones & network architecture: design, provisioning, and operation of Azure landing zones for 3-tier web applications with enhanced network segmentation, VNet peering, hub-and-spoke architectures, private endpoints, and firewall integration across separate subscriptions and tenants.

• Azure DevOps governance & operations: ownership of the Azure DevOps organization, including projects, repositories, and CI/CD pipelines; implementation of governance requirements such as branch policies, approval gates, permission models, and audit-ready operating structures.

• Infrastructure as Code (Terraform): design, implementation, and operation of a modular Terraform architecture for standardized cloud infrastructure deployment, including state management, provider versioning, reusability, and policy-as-code approaches.

• CI/CD pipeline engineering: design, operation, and optimization of complex YAML-based CI/CD pipelines with multi-stage deployments, template standardization, self-hosted agents, integrated secret management, and automated quality and security checks.

• Git migration & platform consolidation: planning and execution of repository and pipeline migration from Azure DevOps to GitLab CI/CD, including automated scripts, full Git history transfer, pipeline porting, and platform consolidation.

• Container & platform operations (AKS): operation and security assessment of containerized workloads on Azure Kubernetes Service, centralization of on-premises container registries for ACR.

• OpenShift (OCP) security reviews: security assessment of code baselines, build pipelines, and deployment processes for on-premises OpenShift clusters with critical applications, and derivation of specific hardening recommendations.

• Shift-left security & DevSecOps transformation: introduction of a company-wide shift-left approach for early security integration in development and deployment processes, enabling developers to perform self-led security checks and sustainably reduce vulnerabilities before production (IDE integrations, pre-commit hooks, local scanners).

• Software supply chain security: analysis and mitigation of supply chain risks in NPM- and Yarn-based applications through dependency audits, CI/CD pipeline hardening, token rotation, and restriction of risky build and lifecycle mechanisms.

• Frontend & framework security (React / Next.js): security assessment and coordination of critical vulnerability remediation across platform applications and web frameworks, including coordination and complementary technical mitigations with all teams following BSI alerts.

• Software composition analysis (SCA): introduction and operation of automated vulnerability scans for container images, pipelines/artifacts, and third-party dependencies, including SBOM exports within CI/CD pipelines.

• SAST/DAST integration: design and piloting of static and dynamic application security tests in close collaboration with security architecture and development teams, for continuous improvement of code and runtime security, and establishing operational acceptance tests.

• Artifact & registry consolidation: analysis and consolidation of all package and container repositories for service applications and AKS workloads, aiming for a centralized, secured registry strategy with centralized vulnerability scanning and governance.

• Dependency-Track & SBOM strategy: advising the compliance board on introducing a central SBOM and vulnerability management platform to increase enterprise-wide dependency transparency and accelerate CVE response capability.

• CI/CD pipeline hardening: security analysis and cleanup of the existing pipeline landscape by removing unused pipelines, improving secrets hygiene, implementing least-privilege principles, and isolating build agent environments.

• Azure Web Application Firewall (WAF) optimization: analysis and tuning of existing Azure WAF rules (OWASP Top 10 Core Rule Set, DSR/SDC, custom rules) to defend against known vulnerabilities and exploit patterns, including reducing false positives and improving threat detection.

• Documentation & stakeholder communication: creating and maintaining technical documentation, runbooks, and architecture overviews in Jira and Confluence, as well as active knowledge transfer between operations, development, security, and compliance stakeholders.

Support for Internal Audit:

Conducting an audit of the data protection officer and data protection management:

• Preparing an audit program based on the audit field concept
• Requesting the necessary audit documentation
• Carrying out control testing based on the audit program with the following focus:
• Reviewing the relevant PPS processes
• Reviewing the data protection mission statement, data protection policy, and data protection management concept
• Conducting audit interviews with the data protection officer
• Preparing the audit documentation
• Training a junior auditor in the methodology of Internal Audit
• Coordinating the audit documentation with the head of audit

Compliance department setup & DORA operationalization

• Setup of a complete compliance organization according to DORA
• Development and operationalization of SfO
• Use of AI agents for automation:
• Evaluation of due diligence questionnaires including risk classification
• AI-supported contract analysis (DORA/MaRisk compliance)
• Monitoring of external data sources (cyber incidents, news feeds)
• Setup of a decentralized risk and action register
• Creation of gap analyses and derivation of actions
• Setup and maintenance of the outsourcing information register
• Use of own TPRM frameworks, checklists and process models

Compliance department setup & DORA operationalization

• Setup of a complete compliance organization according to DORA
• Development and operationalization of SfO
• Use of AI agents for automation:
• Evaluation of due diligence questionnaires including risk classification
• AI-supported contract analysis (DORA/MaRisk compliance)
• Monitoring of external data sources (cyber incidents, news feeds)
• Setup of a decentralized risk and action register
• Creation of gap analyses and derivation of actions
• Setup and maintenance of the outsourcing information register
• Use of own TPRM frameworks, checklists and process models
• Project controlling - presentation and structured measurement of achieved project goals within management reporting.

• Management and optimization of a portfolio of about 100 projects (launches, in-field solutions, data & analytics, digital solutions, digital products)
• Optimization of the existing project standard (playbook) and alignment with the European and global organization (USA)
• Coaching project managers on setup, planning, cooperation with business, GDPR, GxP, data security and launches
• Preparing projects for works council information and project closeout communication
• Optimization of resource management (tracking, allocation, prioritization)
• Taking over individual project leads (off-/transboarding, event management, checking whether WhatsApp is allowed on a business smartphone)
• Supporting the hiring of external project managers
• Optimization of meeting structure, project controlling (KPIs), change and demand management
• Optimization of risk, issue, dependency and quality management and support during internal audits (GxP)
• Optimization of the portfolio steering tool (Smartsheet) on national, European and global level
• Design and implementation of a Business Value Complexity Scoring
• Building a strategic PMO with a sister department and optimizing cross-functional teams
• Reporting, communication and escalation at management level
• Leadership coaching for several future leaders (short-time assignment)
• Development of the concepts "PPM as a Service" and "Internal Customer Approach"
• Development and review of a concept "AI Data Governance" including roles and processes
• Selection and onboarding of the successor

• Complete overhaul of the ISMS according to ISO 27001
• Conducted a comprehensive gap analysis
• Reduced ISMS documentation by 30% through consolidation and process optimization
• Introduced a full PDCA cycle for continuous improvement
• Established the ISMS within the company
• Implemented the necessary processes
• Managed and conducted internal and external audits
• Developed and implemented a company-wide risk management system
• Deployed an ISMS tool including process design and training
• KRITIS compliance: Prepared and provided required evidence, liaised with regulatory authorities, planned, documented, and implemented an attack detection system (SIEM), co-led the BCMS/ITSCM implementation subproject
• NIS-2 implementation: Gap analysis, risk assessments, training for executives and staff
• Led a cybersecurity team of 3 members
• Conducted various internal and external audits, managed providers, introduced continuous improvement
• Project consulting: closely coordinated with business and system owners, launched an online shop, a mobile app, and a customer portal
• Redesigned the security architecture, reducing administrative efforts by 20%
• Implemented ITIL processes (e.g., change management)
• Revised service agreements with internal and external providers
• Developed a security awareness strategy, ran social engineering tests, introduced and monitored phishing simulations, created various awareness materials, gave presentations
• Managed a budget of one million euros

• Leading the subproject Test & Acceptance & Quality Assurance
• Project/program management according to Prince2
• Create and update subproject plan
• Resource management
• Creating and carrying out tests, creating tests in Azure DevOps, MS Dynamics etc.
• Process modeling
• Documenting project progress with PowerPoint and SÖREN (in-house development)
• Acceptance of the respective tests by the end customer
• Monitoring and reporting for the subproject
• Budget: N/A
• Team: 4 people

• Devised a new Domain-Driven Design architecture for a core system: reverse-engineered a central component, refactored the data-access layer to minimise database round-trips (improving scalability) and migrated processing to async.
• Decomposed the platform into independent .NET Core microservices (database-per-service) with RabbitMQ pub/sub using the Outbox Pattern + Saga choreography, behind an Ocelot API Gateway (JWT, rate limiting, CORS, health checks).
• Delivered on .NET Core / Angular / SQL Server / EF Core with Docker and Azure DevOps CI/CD; implemented health checks and CORS; contributes technical designs for stories in agile Scrum.
• Sole ADR owner; mentored 3 engineers and presented architecture decisions directly to the Director of Corporate IT.

• Design and global rollout of sensitivity labels (confidentiality labels) for automated classification and encryption of business-critical data.
• Definition and rollout of Data Loss Prevention (DLP) policies to protect IP and personal data across endpoints, Exchange, SharePoint, Teams, and non-Microsoft clouds.
• Setup of Insider Risk Management policies to detect and contain excessive data leaks and risky user behavior.
• Implementation of GDPR and retention requirements through automated retention policies and structured records management.
• Technical support for legal teams in internal and external investigations using eDiscovery (Standard/Premium) and Content Search.
• Continuous improvement of the security and compliance level by reviewing the Microsoft Compliance Manager and closing gaps (regulations such as ISO 27001, NIS-2)

• Project manager for banking projects