Norbert Stein

Software Engineer und Tech Lead

Norbert Stein
Leipzig, Germany

Experience

Mar 2023 - Present
2 years
Berlin, Germany

Software Engineer and Tech Lead

  • Training and official certification as Certified Kubernetes Application Developer
  • Open-source development and documentation in a personal project
  • Keeping updated about cloud native and AI technologies through courses and books

Tech: Kubernetes, Docker, Typescript, Node.js

Apr 2022 - Sep 2022
6 months
Berlin, Germany

Senior Software Engineer

Hive Technologies GmbH

Hive is a logistics and fulfillment company that handles and streamlines e-commerce operations for online brands. I joined them during a phase of very strong growth and worked in the team responsible for the integration of shop platforms and ERPs. The main challenges were scaling up all relevant systems and also adjusting the connectors for new clients in a timely yet thorough fashion. Some of my tasks included:

  • Implement, improve and scale integrations for various ERPs and shop systems (Shopify, Xentral etc.)
  • Refactor and scale background workers (Sidekiq) for higher throughput and better error resilience
  • Shape abstract shop integration for better maintainability and easier addition of future integrations
  • Improve observability with structured and centralized logging (AWS Cloudwatch Logs)

Tech: Ruby, Rails, Postgres, Sidekiq, AWS, Docker, Github Actions, Terraform, Grafana

Jul 2020 - Dec 2021
1 year 6 months
Berlin, Germany

Senior Software Engineer

Good Hood GmbH (nebenan.de)

nebenan.de is Germany's largest social network for neighbors. I worked with them in a series of projects to handle the technical integration of various partners, and build customized satellite sites on top of their core platform. Some of my tasks included:

  • Implement back office to integrate with partners and core platform
  • Interactive map (React, Mapbox) with live display of local partner businesses
  • Migration of tech stacks from Heroku to AWS
  • Integration of a headless CMS for marketing campaigns (Contentful)
  • Support of project manager with technical project planning

Tech: Ruby, Rails, Javascript, React, Postgres, Heroku, AWS, Contentful, Ansible

Jul 2019 - Jan 2020
7 months
Berlin, Germany

Lead Developer

MeinWunschcatering GmbH

MeinWunschcatering is a marketplace that connects individuals and companies seeking a professional catering with several hundred catering partners throughout three European countries. I led a small team of three developers responsible for the online shop, partner backend and several internal tools. Some tasks and accomplishments include:

  • Complete migration of the infrastructure to a new AWS stack
  • Setup of automated build pipeline to make releasing smooth and easy for the dev team
  • Full rewrite of the partner backend from scratch, and addition of critical features
  • Massive reduction of technical debt throughout the app to improve team velocity

Tech: Ruby, Rails, Javascript, Node.js, Vue.js, Postgres, AWS, Docker, Kubernetes

Apr 2018 - Apr 2019
1 year 1 month
Berlin, Germany

Lead Developer

Zinsbaustein GmbH

Zinsbaustein is a crowdfunding platform for real estate projects in a quickly growing market. As interim technical lead, I oversaw and was responsible for all software development (frontend and backend) and technical operation of the platform. In this role, I also collaborated closely with the product manager, designer, and other stakeholders. Tasks included:

  • Full stack maintenance and feature development for a Rails-based monolith
  • Refactoring in preparation for a more scalable and maintainable distributed architecture
  • Supporting product manager with technical planning (user stories, roadmaps)
  • Setup of build pipeline with CircleCI, including continuous deploys
  • Screening, interviewing, and evaluation of new candidates

Tech: Ruby, Rails, Javascript, AWS, Postgres

Apr 2017 - Nov 2017
8 months
Berlin, Germany

Lead Developer

Zinsbaustein GmbH

Zinsbaustein is a crowdfunding platform for real estate projects in a quickly growing market. As interim technical lead, I oversaw and was responsible for all software development (frontend and backend) and technical operation of the platform. In this role, I also collaborated closely with the product manager, designer, and other stakeholders. Tasks included:

  • Full stack maintenance and feature development for a Rails-based monolith
  • Refactoring in preparation for a more scalable and maintainable distributed architecture
  • Supporting product manager with technical planning (user stories, roadmaps)
  • Setup of build pipeline with CircleCI, including continuous deploys
  • Screening, interviewing, and evaluation of new candidates

Tech: Ruby, Rails, Javascript, AWS, Postgres

Jun 2015 - Oct 2016
1 year 5 months
Berlin, Germany
Remote

Senior Software Engineer

Sennheiser

For this client, I worked remotely with a distributed team of experts on a large global and multi-language website. My responsibilities comprised the full web stack. Besides active development, I also consulted the dev team regarding technology and architecture decisions as well as various best practices. Furthermore, I supported the project manager with requirement definitions and process improvements.

  • Technical integration and relaunch of the global site with a new responsive design
  • Migrating site search functionality from Solr to Elasticsearch
  • Continuously extend, improve, and refactor the customized multi-site CMS solution
  • Consulting with focus on the improvement of code maintainability and development processes
  • Supporting project manager in process improvements and technical planning
Nov 2014 - Apr 2015
6 months
Berlin, Germany

Senior Software Engineer

HERE, a Nokia business

HERE offers fresh maps and location experiences across multiple screens and operating systems. As part of the innovation team, I contributed to the backend services to provide personalized maps to the users. This involved adding new features as well as stabilizing and consolidating prototypes for product release. The main challenges were scaling the backend and making the location-based data contextually relevant to users.

  • Continuous prototyping and improvement of location services along with the mobile apps development team and designers
  • Profiling, optimizing, and scaling of the globally distributed Node.js based backend
  • Design and implementation of several REST APIs as well as an Angular.js based admin interface
Jan 2014 - Jul 2014
7 months
Berlin, Germany

Senior Software Engineer

Trademob GmbH

Trademob is a demand-side platform (DSP) for programmatic buying of advertisement. The company grew significantly from small start-up to one of the largest DSP's in Germany during the time of my two projects. This brought a host of challenges for the entire IT team. I worked as a server-side software engineer on large parts of the technology stack, mostly in Node.js and Rails. Many of the challenges in this project concerned scalability, performance, and availability of the involved systems.

  • Continuous development, optimization, and scaling of the Node.js-based bidding system that receives about 1.5 billion requests per day (50k requests / second at peaks)
  • Development and maintenance of various downstream services for processing and matching of the incoming data (Node.js, Ruby, Cassandra, Redis)
  • Integration for the internal Rails-based campaign management dashboard
  • Configuration management with Chef, build automation with Jenkins
  • Leveraging the AWS cloud infrastructure (EC2, S3, Elasticache etc.)
Oct 2012 - Sep 2013
1 year
Berlin, Germany

Senior Software Engineer

Trademob GmbH

Trademob is a demand-side platform (DSP) for programmatic buying of advertisement. The company grew significantly from small start-up to one of the largest DSP's in Germany during the time of my two projects. This brought a host of challenges for the entire IT team. I worked as a server-side software engineer on large parts of the technology stack, mostly in Node.js and Rails. Many of the challenges in this project concerned scalability, performance, and availability of the involved systems.

  • Continuous development, optimization, and scaling of the Node.js-based bidding system that receives about 1.5 billion requests per day (50k requests / second at peaks)
  • Development and maintenance of various downstream services for processing and matching of the incoming data (Node.js, Ruby, Cassandra, Redis)
  • Integration for the internal Rails-based campaign management dashboard
  • Configuration management with Chef, build automation with Jenkins
  • Leveraging the AWS cloud infrastructure (EC2, S3, Elasticache etc.)

Summary

Hi there! I am an experienced software engineer and tech lead with a focus on complex web applications. My current key technologies are Ruby (Rails) and Javascript (Typescript, Node.js, React). I have working knowledge and plenty of experience in the full web stack through a wide range of projects, with an emphasis on backend technologies. With more than fifteen years of hands-on experience under my belt, I know how to build effective and pragmatic solutions for my clients, using the tools that suit the job. I also enjoy sharing and discussing this with others, as well as helping my team succeed. In my work, I enjoy simple yet beautiful and maintainable code. I embrace change and constraints, and I mostly thrive in agile and lean environments. Why work with me? I am offering: - Software development with Ruby (Rails) and Javascript (Typescript, Node.js, React) - Support with dev-ops and automation (Docker, CD, Kubernetes, Terraform, AWS) - Leading and mentoring of engineering teams - Support with technical project management and planning In the collaboration of your team with me, you will receive these benefits: - Your software is state of the art, maintainable, and well-ordered - Your software is based on a deliberate and extendable architecture - Technical decisions are well-prepared and documented - Your team works in a goal-oriented, agile and lean manner - You gain insight into new approaches, best practices, and technologies as used by similar companies

Languages

German
Native
English
Advanced

Education

Oct 2009 - Jun 2010

Maastricht University

MSc · International Business · Maastricht, Netherlands

Jan 2005 - Dec 2006

Växjö University

Media Technology · Växjö, Sweden

Oct 2004 - Jun 2007

FHTW Berlin

BSc · Media and Computing · Berlin, Germany

Certifications & licenses

Certified Kubernetes Application Developer