XML Experts in Berlin

• WiNOWiG enhancements (digitalization & organization)
• Project management for the WiNOWiG project (regulatory offenses)
• Process optimization and coordination

• Designed, built, and launched an internal event planning web application used by over 100 department leads for a large event, despite having no dedicated testing phase.

• Ensured smooth, failure-free operation during first production use, leading to the tool being adopted for future events.

• Automated catering calculations and related workflows, significantly reducing email communication and manual computation effort for meal planning.

• Managed deployment and hosting on a Linux server using Coolify, including application setup and runtime operations.

• Hired and guided a communication designer on UX while independently owning all technical decisions and implementation.

• Designed and developed AI-powered document processing solutions using Python, OCR, NLP, and Large Language Models (LLMs) to automate extraction, validation, and classification of financial documents, reducing processing time by 75%.
• Built intelligent multi-stage workflow automation pipelines integrating AI services, machine learning models, and enterprise systems to streamline financial operations and improve data quality.
• Developed reusable AI-driven transformation frameworks capable of processing structured and unstructured document formats (XML, CSV, JSON, TXT, DAT) and normalizing them into unified business schemas.
• Designed and developed Python-based REST APIs and backend services supporting enterprise finance applications and high-volume data processing workloads.
• Built scalable data synchronization pipelines between Oracle CFIN and SQL databases, incorporating machine learning models for cash-flow forecasting and AP/AR anomaly detection.
• Architected and deployed Apache Airflow workflows to orchestrate AI-powered data pipelines, automating end-to-end processing from document ingestion through financial system integration.
• Led the migration of critical enterprise integrations from MuleSoft to Python-based services, improving maintainability, performance, and operational flexibility while preserving complete data integrity.
• Managed the full API lifecycle including solution design, implementation, documentation, deployment, monitoring, and production support for mission-critical financial systems.
• Collaborated directly with finance stakeholders to identify business challenges, define solution requirements, and deliver measurable operational improvements through automation and AI-driven workflows.
• Worked closely with cross-functional engineering and business teams to rapidly iterate on features, improve processes, and drive successful adoption of AI-enabled solutions.
• Provided technical leadership through architecture reviews, technology decisions, code reviews, and engineering best practices across integration and automation initiatives.
• Mentored developers, established coding standards, and contributed to improving software quality, maintainability, and delivery effectiveness across projects.
• Provided production support during critical month-end and quarter-close financial processes, performing root-cause analysis and implementing rapid fixes to ensure system reliability and data accuracy.

• Freelance product owner, scrum master and agile coach in various projects spanning from local agencies to multinational corporations in diverse industries.

• Last projects:

• Adevinta: Technical Project Manager responsible for coordination of several sub-workstreams building the world’s largest classifieds multi-tenant platform.

• Aroundhome (a ProSiebenSat.1 company): Product Manager implementing and verifying on the business side a concept for digital qualification of user requests for matching service providers.

• Peek & Cloppenburg Düsseldorf: Product Manager Mobile advising on and guiding the rebuild of Android and iOS apps.

• Visual Meta GmbH (an Axel Springer company), Berlin: Director Product co-leading the Product & Engineering department together with the Director Engineering.

• Responsibilities at Visual Meta GmbH:

• Define and deliver a 3–5 year horizon product strategy including a product vision & mission connecting to existing company strategy and strategies from adjacent departments.

• Refine an existing OKR process together with OKR master and directors of other departments to increase focus and outcome.

• Support the Director Engineering in creating a platform transformation strategy to transform a monolithic on-premise tech stack into a service-oriented, cloud-based architecture and establish a domain-based organizational setup.

• Accountability for a motivated and talented team of 5 head-level colleagues and 17 operational team members from product management, data and UX/UI design.

• Key achievements at Visual Meta GmbH:

• Defined and delivered a 3–5 year horizon product strategy including a product vision & mission.

• Increased focus within OKR process by moving from 10 company-level objectives to 2 and from several hundred team-level key results to a few dozen.

• Created a career path framework for the product team defining roles and responsibilities from junior to head level positions.

• Drive migration of enterprise authorization platform from Styra DAS to open-source OPA via Skipper (Zalando's Golang-based ingress proxy) integration
• Optimise k8s resources and integrate native Prometheus metrics with OPA
• Migrate from internal monitoring solution to Prometheus CRs + Dash0

Tech Stack: Java/Kotlin, Golang, Python, Spring Boot, AWS, Kubernetes, Docker, OpenTofu, Prometheus, Grafana

Consumer Cards Solution Architect

• Provided architectural leadership in Consumer Cards Domain establishing best practices and improving architectural transparency and maintainability by designing a structured documentation framework to enable reverse engineering of legacy card systems.
• Standardized architectural artefacts including BIAN Business Capabilities, UML diagrams in draw.io format (Use Case, Component, Sequence), naming conventions, document repository, design templates and blueprints, microservices.
• Produced high-level and low-level designs aligned with enterprise architecture governance processes and artefact standards.
• Provided architectural support to the Strategic Card Simplification Programme, focusing on card product migrations and application decommissioning across all countries. Agile environments (Scrum/SAFe).
• Analysed and designed AI use cases in the architecture domain.

Project: Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards (PCI DSS) Strategic Programme

• Analysed and documented existing data flows across card products and geographic regions to assess PCI DSS compliance.
• Identified areas involving sensitive data at rest and data in motion requiring encryption or masking, ensuring adherence to PCI DSS requirements.
• Collaborated with security, infrastructure, and application teams to align encryption strategies with regulatory and organizational policies.
• Provided strategic advisory services on data strategy, data governance, data management, data quality, data architecture, data mesh, MEGA HOPEX, DAMA-DMBOK, event-driven architecture, end-to-end data flows and card product harmonization models.
• Ensured solution design alignment with regulatory compliance (BCBS 239, DORA, GDPR) and internal policies.

Project: Denmark ATM Outsourcing Project

Objective: Outsource ATM operations and maintenance to a third-party provider while expanding the Denmark ATM fleet, with Nordea retaining ownership of ATMs and cash for the existing and extended infrastructure.

• Led a cross-functional delivery team (project management, business analysis, and architecture) and documented the as-is ATM ecosystem architecture, including end-to-end data flows, integrations, and internal/external application interfaces.
• Designed end-to-end processes for authorization, reconciliation, and settlement, aligning operating model, controls, and compliance requirements across Nordea and the outsourced service provider.
• Produced high-level and low-level solution designs using standardized UML artefacts (Use Case, Component, and Sequence diagrams) to support vendor onboarding, integration planning, and implementation.
• Ensured architectural alignment and decision-making across enterprise stakeholders and third-party providers, managing dependencies and interfaces in the context of the outsourcing initiative.

• Developed and deployed microservices in Kotlin and Spring Boot, integrated AWS Secrets Manager to secure credentials and decreased network calls using Spring cache.
• Refactored Kafka consumer using Spring Kafka with semaphore-based backpressure to cap records and keep heap memory stable under spikes; switched to batch upserts to cut down on database invocations; added Testcontainers integration tests for Kafka and database to pave the way for future changes.
• Automated the financial reconciliation workflow in Spring Boot (Kotlin) using Spring Scheduler, transactional boundaries, JPA/Hibernate on MySQL, and Flyway migrations, saving the accounts team 16+ hours per week.
• Designed and dockerized payments end-to-end test framework in Robot (Python) with reusable keyword libraries and profiles; integrated with GitLab CI (JaCoCo XML and HTML reports) to accelerate releases and lift code coverage to 80%.
• Implemented end-to-end observability on Datadog by instrumenting services with Datadog APM, correlating metrics and logs, provisioning dashboards, and creating monitors with burn-rate alerts and anomalies to harden reliability and give stakeholders clear visibility.

• IT training in theory and practice for IT specialists in application development and system integration

The MiDAS program aims to integrate Generative AI across the entire BBM organization. My role is to enable the eBike division to adopt and leverage Generative AI by collaborating closely with the MiDAS team in India.

Management:

• Enable the eBike division to adopt GenAI through tailored solutions.
• Collaborate with the MiDAS team in India to design solutions for Generative AI use cases specific to the eBike division.
• Coordinate with the eBike teams to integrate GenAI systems, tools, plugins, and services provided by the MiDAS team.
• Plan roadmaps with eBike and MiDAS India team Product Managers for the delivery and integration of Generative AI solutions.

• Insurance service provider*

Challenge: Business-critical documents were processed through external OCR providers, with ongoing costs, dependency, and data privacy risks for sensitive insurance data.

Implementation:

• Architecture and production implementation of an on-premise OCR solution with full data ownership
• Methods for recognizing document structures as the basis for automated further processing
• ML-, NLP-, and LLM/VLM-based information extraction, especially from invoices and quotations

Success: Replaced external providers: full data ownership, GDPR-compliant processing, and 75% lower recurring OCR costs per year

Used technologies: Python, Docker, Microservices, FastAPI, PyTorch, Torchvision, MongoDB, MySQL

• Planning and implementing tailored Odoo ERP solutions to support and optimize specific business processes
• Configuring and customizing Odoo modules according to individual customer requirements, including process automation and data integration
• Training and supporting end users and administrators to ensure full use of Odoo features and to enhance user skills
• Providing ongoing post-implementation support, including troubleshooting, maintenance and updates to adapt to new business requirements
• Migrating data and integrating external applications into Odoo environments for a seamless, unified data landscape
• Analyzing and improving existing Odoo systems to boost efficiency and optimize the user experience

• Developed and implemented organization-wide discovery framework based on Ulwick’s Outcome-Driven Innovation; enabled 7 Product Owners to systematically identify and quantify unrealized value through shared outcome language and opportunity scoring methodology
• Transformed Product Owner role from backlog clerks to strategic experimenters; established dedicated time budget for autonomous hypothesis testing and discovery activities
• Rebuilt customer journey maps to start at actual user need (tool selection phase) instead of platform entry point; eliminated manual data aggregation work previously done by project teams
• Implemented OKR framework across 4 product teams; defined quarterly objectives with measurable key results (e.g., 40% reduction in manual integration effort, self-service adoption increase)
• Unified 3 separate platform roadmaps through cross-team dependency mapping and shared service agreements
• Supported enterprise sales cycle with ROI modeling and technical due diligence for automotive and defense customers

• Optimized the data architecture (medallion) to better decouple processing stages and improve transparency and reproducibility
• Ensured technical quality of data processing in Databricks by introducing schema enforcement, data quality checks and a structured data architecture
• Orchestrated pipelines with Azure Data Factory
• Professionalized and automated the development and deployment process by integrating Git and GitHub Actions
• Led the Data Engineering team (3 members) in a functional role
• Conducted workshops to optimize and stabilize the data platform and the development process
• Collected and prioritized new requests, maintained the product backlog
• Technologies: Microsoft Azure (Data Lake, Data Factory), Databricks, Apache Spark (PySpark), Python, SQL, Git, Confluence, Power BI, Power Apps, Dataverse, MS SharePoint, Mural