REST API Expert

Working Environment

• Insurance / Claims Management (Property, Liability, Automotive)
• REST-based ClaimAPI with Guidewire ClaimCenter

Scope

• Further development of the internal REST-based ClaimAPI with Guidewire ClaimCenter as the backend and various portals/front-end offices as clients, and with the following objectives: + increased AI-supported claims processing outside of Guidewire ClaimCenter + and support for all lines (property, liability, automotive).
• Further development of automated claims processing

Activities

• Interfacing IT & Business
• Design activities with documentation in Confluence, Jira: + Requirements engineering (functional and non-functional) + Design of REST endpoints and coordination with interface partners (esp. AI-colleagues) + Identification, design and evaluation of alternative solutions (moving away from a monolithic approach toward fine-grained endpoints, with code reuse across all lines if possible) + Creation / refinement of product backlog items in Jira, i.e. epics, user stories and tasks, incl. alignment with developers & POs during (pre-)refinement sessions + Using AXA Secure GPT when creating / refining user stories (description, acceptance criteria) and designing REST endpoints + Estimation and prioritization of user stories and tasks during Sprint Planning sessions + Coordination and support during the implementation of Product Backlog items + Driving decision making with preparation and presentation of decision-making documents
• Quality assurance: + Test management, including test case creation using Xray in Jira + Test execution using Bruno as REST client and in Guidewire ClaimCenter + Submission of test artifacts for PO approval + Analysis of production bugs

Methods Big Room Planning (aka PI-Planning in SAFe), Scrum, BPMN, EPK, UML, ERM, DDD

Tools / Tech Stack Teams, Confluence, Jira with Xray, OpenAPI/Swagger, REST, JSON, XML, MS Office, Bruno, GitHub repository (reading), Guidewire ClaimCenter, AXA Secure GPT (AXA's in-house GenAI solution based on Azure OpenAI)

I designed and built a self-service AWS platform for Data Science teams with little or no infrastructure-as-code experience. A team writes about 10 lines of Python and gets a deployable stack with full SDLC release cycle that already follows the governance rules. Networking, encryption, IAM and tagging are decided by the platform, not by each team.

New teams or AWS accounts are onboarded with one pull request. Waste prevention and cost control is built into the defaults: Data scientists don't need infrastructure skills.

• Construct library (AWS CDK, Python). Built a versioned catalog of about 20 hardened constructs for being used in data-science projects with ML context
• Governance as code
• Multi-account, multi-tenant
• Golden-path scaffolding
• CI/CD and supply chain. Built reusable GitHub Actions workflows
• Release engineering
• QA with e2e, contract testing and unit test coverage with each release candidate

Developed the product vision and outcome strategy for a new registry platform, designed a management workshop for strategic alignment, conducted BPMN process mapping across systems and roles, analyzed user story practices and further developed them on an outcome basis, and brought together stakeholders from business departments, management and the external development partner.

Skills: Product Strategy, Outcome Roadmapping, Stakeholder Workshops, BPMN/Process Analysis, Miro, Linear

Agile Transformation: introducing agile principles and transforming traditional IT departments into Scrum and Kanban teams

IT Operating Model: redesigning the IT organization and introducing modern delivery structures and roles

Flight Levels: building up Flight Levels practices within IT to align strategy, coordination and operational execution

Leadership & Coaching: recruiting Agile Coaches and coaching Scrum Masters and IT leaders

ERP Operations: acting as Interim Product Owner for the existing ERP landscape and ensuring business continuity

ERP Transformation: reorganizing and supporting the ERP migration as a Project Manager; Phase 1 (financial accounting) live since October 2025

Operational Core (ERP): establishing dedicated teams for ERP Support, Feature Development, and ERP Migration

Modern Workplace: initiating the transition towards a Microsoft 365-based cloud workplace environment

Integration: establishing a dedicated team to drive integration and connectivity initiatives

Warehouse Operations: building a cross-functional team to support logistics and warehouse-related capabilities

Maintenance & Operations (M&O): introducing a dedicated team for system engineering, security, stable operations and continuous improvement

AI Initiatives: identifying and promoting practical Artificial Intelligence use cases across the IT department

As Interim Head of IT for a German medium-sized industrial distributor, I am responsible for 31 IT employees and lead the digital and organizational transformation, reporting directly to executive leadership. I took over an IT department with almost no basic structures – no clear roles, processes, documentation or ticket system – and with significant technical debt that tied up most of its capacity. Introduced agile principles and ways of working in the IT organization and transformed the traditionally structured IT department into cross-functional Scrum and Kanban teams focused on transparency, collaboration, and customer value delivery.

Redesigned the entire IT organization by establishing a modern operating model, introducing new roles such as Product Owner, Scrum Master and Solution Architect and strengthening the organization through strategic hiring and targeted capability development. Recruited and onboarded Agile Coaches to accelerate the transformation and personally managed and coached Scrum Masters as well as IT department leaders to foster servant leadership, self-management and a culture of continuous improvement.

Aligned IT-internal planning across eight teams to three Flight Levels based on Klaus Leopold (strategy, coordination, team), laying the foundation for later company-wide portfolio management. Consolidated the backlog of more than 10 workstreams and prioritized it by business value and cost of delay. Introduced a ticketing system to increase transparency and enable data-driven decision-making, flow-based work management, and greater accountability at all levels.

Established and supported multiple cross-functional teams, including the Operational Core (ERP) domain with dedicated streams for Support, Feature Development and ERP Migration, as well as teams responsible for Warehouse Operations, Maintenance & Operations (M&O) including system engineering and security, Modern Workplace, Data Quality and integration initiatives. Worked closely with Agile Coaches to support team development, remove impediments, and continuously improve delivery effectiveness.

Acted as Interim Product Owner for the operation and enhancement of the existing ERP landscape while supporting the ERP migration as a Project Manager. Reorganized the project organization and had the already negotiated contract with the implementation partner realigned with a focus on approach and overall responsibility; Phase 1 (financial accounting) has been live since October 2025. Collaborated with the selected implementation partner to design and establish the project organization and target operating model for the ERP transformation, introducing agile delivery structures and ways of working. Facilitated the alignment between business, IT and the external vendor and played a key role in negotiating the contractual framework and delivery model to ensure a sustainable foundation for the transformation program.

Initiated the strategic modernization of the workplace environment through the adoption of Microsoft 365 cloud capabilities, establishing the foundation for enhanced collaboration, scalability and future digital services.

Launched AI initiatives to identify practical business use cases and promote the responsible adoption of Artificial Intelligence across the IT department. Encouraged self-management and empowered teams to take ownership of decisions, delivery and continuous improvement.

• Design, development, and productive rollout of an Enterprise HR Copilot based on Microsoft Copilot Studio to automate internal HR processes
• Development of an AI-supported assistant for answering employee inquiries based on a SharePoint knowledge base and internal company HR documentation
• Integration of the Copilot into Microsoft Teams, including welcome logic, user guidance, and role-based routing
• Automation of HR processes and approval workflows with Microsoft Power Automate to reduce manual processing steps
• Development of realistic HR documents and response templates with Azure OpenAI, taking business requirements and consistent company policies into account
• Implementation of prompt strategies, knowledge management, and response optimization to improve response quality and user acceptance
• Close collaboration with business departments to analyze requirements and integrate the AI solution into existing company processes

Technologies:

Microsoft Copilot Studio, Microsoft Teams, Azure OpenAI, SharePoint, Power Automate, Power Platform, Microsoft 365, Prompt Engineering, Workflow Automation

• Focus on optimizing and further developing the internal customer EBICS application
• Functional and technical consulting for Aareal First Financial Solutions AG on EBICS standard products and applications in the areas of operations and further development, as well as project-related communication with external development partners and the product manufacturer to implement the corresponding technical optimizations
• As the functional coordinator, providing advice on content-related and regulatory requirements as well as technical prerequisites and requirements, and bringing these together at the functional level
• Consulting on the use of EBICS formats
• Reviewing the current EBICS standard for optimization and further development potential
• Analyzing the current state to identify development potential and deriving appropriate recommendations for action while considering regulatory requirements
• Conducting EBICS tests throughout the project
• Functional responsibility for requirements management and, in this context, recording and documenting requirements for such tests
• Designing a functional and sustainable test management system
• Conducting and evaluating tests
• Consulting on sustainable quality assurance and audits
• Project language: German and English
• Tools/Methods: MS Project, MS Office, MS Visio, TestRail, Confluence, Jira, Business Logics Bankkrecher, Business Logics Test Data Generator, Business Logics Banking Tool, Business Logics Test System, DBEAVER, Squirrel, Unix Virtual Machines, WinSCP, Kitty, Putty, various Aareal Bank products, Online Banking Portal, Aareal Sign, core banking system, SAP Blue Eagle, SAP RE-FX, Aareon Wodis Sigma, Haufe Real Estate Wowinex, GAP Group Immotion, UTS Karthago, SAP IS-U/Waste, SIV kVASy, various EBICS clients

• Impact: Structured requirements analysis and quality assurance as a foundation for the further development of a software solution.
• Analysis, documentation, and coordination of requirements. Conducting stakeholder analyses, interviews, and workshops to gather and validate requirements. Conducting requirements reviews and working closely with business departments and development teams.

Techniques & Tools: Requirements Engineering, Stakeholder Management, Workshop Facilitation, System Context Modeling, Requirements Reviews, Quality Scenarios, Miro, Jira, Confluence

Remote freelance role focused on Agentic AI strategy, secure application patterns, and reusable agentic workflows for a government agency.

• Development and implementation of an open-source Agentic AI strategy for a government agency, with a focus on GDPR, security, and self-hosted solutions
• Development of reusable agentic workflows and business applications that enable non-technical employees to solve business problems independently
• Implementation of nine business applications with Single Sign-On (SSO) and Azure PostgreSQL integration on Hetzner Linux servers

Techstack: Python, Streamlit, Anthropic SDK (Claude), Azure, Linux, PostgreSQL, MS SQL, Angular

• Analysis of existing microservice structures and integration into the event-driven architecture
• Design and implementation of prototypes
• Introduction of structured workflows and integration into a solid testing strategy
• Team: Small specialized team (3-5 people) from analysis through implementation readiness
• Documentation of architectural decisions and definition of interfaces
• Integration of the event-driven pipeline into the existing landscape
• Technologies: Kafka, Docker, Microservices, Event-Driven Architecture, Java, Liquibase

• Development of scalable backend applications with C#/.NET and Java
• Design and implementation of distributed microservice architectures
• Development and integration of REST APIs for industrial applications
• Development of modern web applications with React, Angular, and TypeScript
• Implementation of MQTT-based communication solutions
• Integration of industrial protocols such as OPC UA and Modbus TCP
• Development of batch, process control, and HMI components
• Containerization and deployment of applications with Docker
• Conducting code reviews and supporting architecture decisions
• Close collaboration with Product Owners, QA, and interdisciplinary teams
• Analysis of business requirements and implementation of technical solutions
• Further development of existing software architectures with a focus on maintainability and performance

Technologies: C#, .NET, ASP.NET Core, Java, C++, React, Angular, TypeScript, Vue.JS, MQTT, OPC UA, Modbus TCP, Docker, GitLab, MariaDB, MySQL, Linux

• Claude Code subagents, MCP, Pydantic V2, pytest, bandit

• Designed and shipped 3 specialized agents that hand work down a line: a research agent writes a cited implementation spec, a coding agent builds the modular code and its tests, a review agent ranks findings by severity and applies the fixes. Each handoff is a structured document, so no stage depends on another agent's context window.

• Connected the research agent to an academic-research MCP server (Semantic Scholar, ArXiv, Hugging Face Hub, citation snowballing) so every reference traces to a tool result rather than the model. Gated commits behind ruff, mypy, pytest and bandit, required human sign-off before installs and commits, and persisted session state on disk so long runs survive a context reset.

Design, development, and market launch of digital products and platforms – from strategic alignment and agile implementation to Go-to-Market and Go-Live, integrating AI into processes and products

• Planned and developed a CPU monitoring application for monitoring system performance and resource utilization.
• Designed and implemented a Spring Boot backend providing a REST API for processing and exposing monitoring data.
• Developed the React frontend for presenting monitoring information in a clear and user-friendly interface.
• Integrated PostgreSQL for persistent storage and management of application data.
• Containerized the application and its services using Docker Compose.
• Automated infrastructure provisioning and deployment using Terraform on AWS.
• Structured the application as a modern, maintainable system using REST-based communication between frontend and backend.
• Designed and developed a secure, scalable CPU monitoring architecture (cpu-watcher) with a dedicated collector application that streams monitoring data to the backend, reducing direct exposure of system resources.
• Designed a secure cloud infrastructure with the database isolated within a private network and OIDC-based authentication.
• Implemented Infrastructure as Code with Terraform and integrated version-controlled CI/CD pipelines to automate testing, infrastructure changes, and application deployments.
• Designed and implemented the frontend delivery architecture using AWS CloudFront.

Stack: Spring Boot · React · PostgreSQL · REST API · Docker Compose · Terraform · AWS

• Built a scalable nearshore IT developer hub (Croatia, Czech Republic, Poland) as an independent company through a BOT model (Build – Operate – Transfer)
• Identified, selected, and managed full-service agencies; introduced management and control mechanisms, including KPIs, SLAs, and regular service reviews
• Prepared and reviewed data processing agreements and framework contracts in coordination with Legal & Compliance; integrated regulatory requirements (including KRITIS) into process design
• Advised on cloud vs. on-premise strategies, data storage, and authorization concepts; supported Procurement with tendering and service provider evaluations
• Managed change and process harmonization between internal teams and nearshore partners; reported to executive management, CFO, and CIO

Result: Scalable IT developer hub with an audit-ready governance model, reduced operating costs, and accelerated product development.