Kristi Buda Resume

About

I love to express my thoughts through the combination of different basic units of programmable colour on a output surface and projecting mechanism that shows often graphic images to you.

www.buda.dev
London, UK

EMBA
contact@buda.dev

Strategic Leadership and Innovation:

Led large-scale projects spanning multiple departments, from Engineering and Design to Data Engineering and AI/ML, with a focus on enhancing operational efficiency, fostering innovation, and driving company growth.
Enhanced work delivery and improved team performance by scaling cross-functional teams through data-driven approaches.
Establishing strong relationships with clients and partners to drive collaboration and ensure successful project outcomes.
Conducting market research and competitive analysis to identify emerging trends and technologies, driving continuous improvement and innovation.

Innovative Engineering Solutions:

Designed and implemented robust data extraction pipelines capable of efficiently processing billions of records driving the expansion of a product built upon this technology.
Led the research and development efforts of an experimental product, strategically guiding its growth and evolution to become one of the pillars of the company’s success.
Constructed a complex data structure enabling instant creation and updates for an unlimited number of items in constant time, serving as the foundation for a framework that became the bedrock of the entire business.
Designed and implemented an innovative interaction empowering data experts to extract, develop, and visualize customized dashboards on the fly, revolutionized workflow, enhancing productivity and flexibility in data analysis.

Professional Skills and Competencies:

Advanced organisational strategy and planning.
Engineering and Managing Operations, Systems, and Processes.
Strategic Leadership and Management.
Architecture and Implementation.

Experience

I've built my career creating products from scratch, collaborating with international companies, and leading projects from inception to fully-fledged solutions used worldwide. With a focus on innovation and strategic leadership, I've successfully navigated complex projects spanning various departments, including Engineering, Design, and AI/ML.

Education

Executive Master of Business Administration

2023 - Present

Aston University, Birmingham, United Kingdom

Aston ranks in the top 1% of global business schools, holding a triple accreditation.
The EMBA program provides participants with a comprehensive understanding of leadership principles, advanced strategic thinking, and effective decision-making through engaging in practical leadership applications.

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science

Oct. 2014 - Sep 2019

University of Tirana, Albania

As Albania's oldest and largest public university, the University of Tirana is renowned for its commitment to academic excellence. The Bachelor of ICT program, integral to the university's offerings, is strategically designed to equip students with a strong emphasis on practical system implementation and foster a comprehensive understanding of computer technology.

Professional Experience

Head of Software Engineering, Raft

2024 - Present

London, United Kingdom

Spearheaded company-wide engineering strategy, driving innovation and aligning technical initiatives with business objectives.
Led and mentored a high-performing engineering team of 30+, fostering a culture of continuous learning and cutting-edge technology adoption.
Developed and implemented a robust performance management framework, enhancing productivity and accelerating career growth for engineers and team leads.
Optimized technical debt management while consistently delivering scalable, high-quality software solutions on time and within budget
Bridged communication gaps between technical and non-technical stakeholders, ensuring clear understanding and alignment of engineering projects across the organization

Tech used:

Python, FastAPI, Flask, React, Redux, JavaScript, Golang, Celery, RabbitMQ, Kafka, Elastic Search, Logstash, Kibana, Liquibase, MongoDB, PostgreSQL, Neo4J, Docker, Kubernetes, Google Cloud Platform, DataDog, Grafana, NestJs, Cassandra, Airflow, Websockets, Atomic Design, Alembic, Unleash

Engineering Manager, Raft

2022 - Present

London, United Kingdom

Headed the Research and Development department, driving process improvement, efficiency gains, and innovation for future company growth.
Orchestrated multiple software engineering projects, ensuring seamless collaboration across teams and departments for successful execution and completion.
Restructured recruitment pipelines for product and engineering, optimizing processes to attract and retain top talent, enhancing team performance and project outcomes.
Scaled the Vision team from a research project to a vital company pillar, focusing on innovation crucial to overall success.
Developed growth roadmaps to guide engineers’ professional advancement, facilitating progression into advanced roles.
Spearheaded the creation of a highly efficient data processing pipeline handling millions of records daily for multiple organizations.
Managed projects across departments, implementing a sophisticated in-app data search engine and overseeing a multi-database system for seamless data processing.
Designed and built a high-performance, event-driven microservice architecture to extract, transform, and load data across teams.
Implemented a multi-database querying system for retrieving data from various PostgreSQL databases.

Tech used:

Lead Engineer, Polyteia

May 2018 - Dec 2021

Berlin, Germany

Smart Governance Platform for cities and towns, helping mayors, treasurers, and department heads make smart decisions with better data.

Headed the development of an advanced dashboard builder, enabling data analysts to effortlessly create visually compelling visualizations.
Led the Front-End development for the application, crafting an intuitive user interface and architecting the platform’s user-friendly front-end structure.
Engineered the architecture for the desktop app version, ensuring convenient accessibility on-the-go.
Developed a custom state management library for the platform’s data bridge, ensuring seamless data transfer across services.
Contributed to the design and implementation of the platform’s distributed system structure, emphasizing scalability and reliability.

Tech used:

React, Redux, GraphQL, Electron, Jest, Puppeteer, Cypress, React-vis, D3, NodeJS, Nestjs, JavaScript, Telekom cloud

Head of Frontend, Publer

Jul. 2017 - Sep. 2018

Tirana, Albania

Virtual Social Media Superhero that lets you collaborate, schedule & analyze your posts for Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Instagram.

Orchestrated the development of a seamless front-end architecture, fostering an optimal user experience.
Spearheaded the design and development of the application's front-end, leveraging diverse technologies to create intricate structures and enhance performance.
Designed and implemented the user interface and company branding, ensuring a cohesive and visually appealing experience for users.
Enhanced the overall project success by collaboratively working with cross-functional teams and employing effective communication strategies.

Tech used:

React, React-redux, Recharts, JavaScript, Ruby on Rails, AWS, Redis, PostreSQL, Docker, Kubernetes, Cucumber, Jest

Full Stack Engineer, SoftUp Technologies

Feb 2017 - Jun 2017

Tirana, Albania

Software development agency providing product development for international clients.

Built user-friendly web applications.
Built mobile apps.
Contributed to the Back-end development.

Tech used:

React, React-redux, JavaScript, NodeJs, AWS, Parse Platform, MongoDB, MySQL

Full-stack developer, Softlab

Sep. 2016 - Feb 2017

Tirana, Albania

Software development agency providing web & mobile applications for startups, enterprises, and companies.

Contributed in building full stack and API's.
Contributed in building web applications and websites for several clients.
Built Mobile applications using React-Native and Firebase.

Tech used:

React, React-redux, JavaScript, NodeJs, React-Native AWS, Ruby on Rails, MongoDB, PostgreSQL

Noted supplemental projects and activities

Finalist at Data for Local Environments Challenge

March 2023 - May 2023

London, United Kingdom

A partnership of organizations (IDSP, Microsoft, LinkedIn, ODI, UKPN) that aims to use open data to address societal challenges, such as improving local environments and reaching net-zero goals.

Identified crucial data on public buildings’ energy consumption, locations (GIS), and electric grid.
Designed and built a secure and reliable data architecture by combining 8 different data sources.
Conducted a deep analysis on energy usage in public buildings, emphasizing environmentally friendly machinery.
Developed a user-centric, no-code data tool to assess power availability and calculate CO2 emissions reduction per school.

Lead Engineer, Lesido

May 2021 - September 2022

Munich, Germany

Interactive access to hundreds of hand-picked and award-winning picture books from around the world ready to read with people via video chat.

Built the front-end and mobile architecture.
Lead the development of the front-end application.
Collaborated with the co-founders in building a pleasant user experience.
Built a custom book reader.
Set up the front-end development convention.

Jury member and speaker, betaPlan

Apr. 2021

Tirana, Albania

Hack for Albania is a 2-day hackathon engaging young engineers in finding solutions for their current problems.

Closely followed the development of the projects as a tech consultant.
Reviewed the end solutions for both coding and design solutions.
Together with the other members, chose and awarded the winning teams.
Presented a talk on "How to build better UX based on data."

Lead Engineer, Yunar by Ambidexter

Oct 2019 - Apr. 2020

Berlin, Germany

Yunar is your wallet for all your loyalty cards, with which you get more out of your purchases. Digitize existing cards and create custom ones for maximizing purchases.

Developed the company’s website in close collaboration with the Marketing department, Designer, and Creative Strategist.
Created Content Management System.
Built custom component localization.

Co-Founder, Jellyfish

Oct. 2018 - Aug. 2019

Tirana, Albania

Jellyfish delivers customized web and mobile solutions through a skilled team of software artisans using cutting-edge technologies, committed to exceptional client results.

Guided the company’s technical direction as the lead for front-end web and mobile technologies, shaping the technological landscape.
Applied graphic design skills to craft visually appealing and user-friendly interfaces, enhancing the overall user experience for clients.
Engineered architectural solutions for a diverse client portfolio, ensuring tailored and effective responses to their specific needs.

Core Software Engineer, Identihub

Jan 2018 - May 2018

Remote

IdentiHub is self-hosted open-source brand & assets management software.

Maintained the front-end part of the application.
Managed the community contributions.
Implemented new features and fixed issues.
Helped in creating the contribution guidelines.

Speaker, OSCAL

May 2018

Tirana, Albania

Talked about building faster and better performing React Applications, using the latest patterns and techniques.

Speaker, SFK19

May 2018

Prishtina, Kosovo

A gentle introduction about WebAssembly

Software Engineer, Reproducible builds

May. 2018 - Jun. 2018

Remote

Reproducible builds are a set of software development practices that create an independently-verifiable path from source code to the binary code used by computers.

Created community style guide following TOR’s and Bootstrap’s convention.
Built mobile-friendly front-end components.

Full Stack Developer & Graphic Designer Copy Best

Jul 2016 - Sep 2017

Remote

Social network supported by I.D.M and financed by US Embassy, meant to bring charity organizations and voluntary individuals closer together.

Designed mobile-friendly web app and artwork.
Contributed as a full stack developer.
Created search engine for in-app usage.
Contributed to building a continuous delivery of the app by introducing automation into the stages of app development.
Built application's internal architecture.

Senior Software Engineer, CodeControl (Freelance)

Apr. 2018 - May 2021

Berlin, Germany

Exclusive support network for top freelancers all around the world. Upon passing a rigid selection process, community members get access to gigs with companies like Siemens, Universal Music, MyMuesli, and many more.

Worked as a freelance Senior Software Engineer on a range of full-stack projects.
Collaborated with product managers to develop project evaluations and estimations.
Served as a lead engineer on multiple projects across various platforms and industries.
Designed and implemented core architectures and led a team of engineers to successful project completion.

Tech used:

React, Redux, React-native, Nodejs, Webflow, Mongodb, PostgreSQL, JavaScript, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Docker, Kubernetes

Full Stack Engineer

Aug. 2014 - Oct. 2018

Remote

Freelance

Built and took part in several full-stack projects using a very broad set of tools.
Created modern performing web applications.
Built several mobile applications.
Developed full-stack applications in a variety of technologies.
Utilized different database tools.
Implemented continuous integration and deployment.
Addressed performance issues across various platforms.

Graphic Designer

Jun. 2011 - Oct. 2018

Remote

Freelance

Designed and took part in several remote projects.
Created various types of designs, including logos, brochures, t-shirt designs, vector illustrations, etc.
Developed several types of 3D models and animations.
Built modern UI/UX designs.