Svilen Yanovski
Senior Technical Leadership · Sofia, Bulgaria

Senior technical leadership for enterprise software delivery.

I help organizations design, build, stabilize, and scale business-critical systems — and introduce AI-assisted development with the engineering discipline it requires.

Start a conversationHow I work

Currently building the foundations of software development teams for BMW via Achala Sulzer.

Selected engagements
BMW · via Achala SulzerFinancial Times · XoomworksMatrixAdessoQuick Business Solutions
Positioning

I work where software delivery becomes a leadership problem.

Most enterprise software does not fail on syntax. It fails on unclear specifications, weak ownership, fragile production paths, and teams that have not been built to deliver. That is the work.

P.01/03

Delivery

Specification, architecture, estimation, and implementation of business-critical software — owned end to end.

P.02/03

Stabilization

Incident analysis and structural remediation for complex applications under production pressure.

P.03/03

AI-assisted engineering

Introducing AI into delivery with the specs, guardrails, reviews, and testing enterprise systems require.

Leadership background

People management started long before software.

Before becoming a software engineer, I served as a naval and merchant navy officer on some of the largest vessels in the world, including Emma-class container vessels and VLCC tankers.

In that environment, decisions affect the vessel, the cargo, the crew, your teammates, and the safety of the operation. There is no room for performative leadership.

I lead by example. Positive leadership — clarity, trust, preparation, accountability — is consistently stronger than management by fear, especially when the stakes are real.

High-stakes operations
Enterprise software delivery
Calm decision-making
Incident response
Crew coordination
Team standards
Responsibility
Delivery ownership
Safety mindset
Production stability

The same operational disciplines now apply to enterprise software delivery.

Current focus

Building the foundations of software teams for BMW.

Engagement led via Achala Sulzer. Focus on team structure, engineering standards, delivery cadence, and the technical groundwork required for sustained enterprise output.

  • F.01/04
    Team foundation

    Roles, ownership boundaries, hiring signals, onboarding paths.

  • F.02/04
    Engineering standards

    Code review, branching, CI/CD, definition of done, quality gates.

  • F.03/04
    Delivery cadence

    Planning, estimation, forecasting, dependency management.

  • F.04/04
    Technical groundwork

    Architecture, environments, observability, release discipline.

Delivery approach

AI-assisted development needs engineering discipline.

Used well, AI compresses delivery without compromising quality. Used carelessly, it produces plausible code that fails under enterprise conditions. The difference is method.

Delivery lifecycle07 / steps
  1. S.01 / 07
    Business concept
    Problem framed in operational terms.
  2. S.02 / 07
    Specification
    Behavior, contracts, acceptance criteria.
  3. S.03 / 07
    Technical design
    Architecture, boundaries, trade-offs.
  4. S.04 / 07
    AI-assisted implementation
    Inside guardrails and conventions.
  5. S.05 / 07
    Review
    Human review with the same rigor.
  6. S.06 / 07
    Testing
    Behavior verified, not visually inferred.
  7. S.07 / 07
    Production validation
    Observability, rollback, evidence.
A.01
Context

AI works against a stated specification, not a vague intent.

A.02
Guardrails

Constraints, conventions, and architectural boundaries are explicit.

A.03
Reviews

Generated code is reviewed with the same rigor as human-authored code.

A.04
Testing

Behavior is verified through tests, not by visual inspection of output.

A.05
Traceability

Decisions, prompts, and changes are auditable.

A.06
Production readiness

Observability, error handling, and rollback are part of the work.

Product initiative

TeamTracker — spec-first, AI-assisted delivery in practice.

A personal product initiative for engineering team management. Built using the same method I bring to client engagements: explicit specifications, AI-assisted implementation under review, and production validation.

TeamTracker · spec sheetv0 / internal
T.01/04
Purpose

Tooling for engineering managers to track delivery health across teams.

T.02/04
Method

Specification-led; AI used inside guardrails; reviews and tests gate merges.

T.03/04
Stack

Java, Spring Boot, Angular, AWS.

T.04/04
Why it matters

Evidence that the delivery approach scales beyond a single client.

Services

Engagement types.

Each engagement is scoped to the problem in front of the organization, not packaged into fixed deliverables.

E.01/06

Technical leadership

Senior leadership for delivery teams: architecture decisions, estimation, prioritization, and accountability for outcomes.

  • Architecture & estimation
  • Delivery ownership
  • Stakeholder alignment
E.02/06

Team foundation

Building the structural basis for new software teams: roles, standards, onboarding, and engineering practice.

  • Hiring signals & structure
  • Engineering standards
  • Onboarding & ramp-up
E.03/06

AI-enhanced development enablement

Introducing AI-assisted development into existing teams with the specs, reviews, and guardrails enterprise systems require.

  • Specification practice
  • Review & testing discipline
  • Tooling & guardrails
E.04/06

Incident analysis

Root-cause analysis for complex applications under production pressure — read the failure, isolate the structural cause, restore confidence.

  • Incident response
  • Forensic investigation
  • Post-incident standards
E.05/06

Stabilization & optimisation plans

Structural remediation programs that move a system from firefighting to predictable operation, with sequenced optimisation thereafter.

  • Stabilization roadmap
  • Performance & cost optimisation
  • Operational hardening
E.06/06

Operational leadership for technical teams

Calm, organized leadership for high-stakes environments — decisions, coordination, and trust under pressure.

  • Lead by example
  • Positive leadership over fear
  • Discipline under pressure
Expertise

Areas of working depth.

Backend
  • Java
  • Spring Boot
  • Quarkus
  • Microservices
  • Enterprise integrations
Frontend
  • Angular
  • TypeScript
  • Component architecture
Cloud & Data
  • AWS
  • Enterprise data flows
  • Observability
  • Release pipelines
Delivery engineering
  • Specification
  • Estimation
  • Planning
  • Forecasting
  • Logistics
Leadership
  • Team foundation
  • Operational leadership
  • Incident response
  • Stakeholder management
Selected experience

A career built across operations and software.

Engagements selected for relevance to enterprise technical leadership and operational discipline.

  1. 2024 – ongoing
    Achala Sulzer · for BMW
    Lead Software Engineer · Technical Leadership

    Building the foundations of software development teams. End-to-end design and implementation of web solutions for the automotive sector — logistics, planning, forecasting, data visualization. Establishing engineering standards, delivery cadence, and architectural groundwork.

  2. 2022 – ongoing
    Quick Business Solutions
    Founder · Lead Software Engineer (B2B)

    My own consultancy company. B2B engagements covering design, implementation, estimation, and per-hour technical consulting for enterprise software delivery.

  3. 2023 – 2024
    Matrix Bulgaria
    Senior Software Engineer

    Designed microservices supporting real-time credit scoring and application workflows. CI/CD with Maven and Jenkins on Java 11 / Spring Boot / Angular.

  4. 2021 – 2022
    Halo Diagnostics
    Senior Software Engineer

    Next-generation platform for medical and radiology clinics in the US.

  5. 2020 – 2021
    Financial Times · via Xoomworks
    Senior Software Engineer

    Internal administration application for printing sites, distribution, and reporting. FT SSO integration; Kubernetes deployment. Java 11, Spring Boot, Neo4j.

  6. 2019 – 2020
    Adesso Bulgaria
    Java Web Developer

    Event-driven microservices for an EU banking regulator validating market transactions against pre-defined rule sets.

  7. 2019
    Questers · for Version1
    Software Engineer

    Internal ERP system covering planning, finance, and time management. Spring, Hibernate, AngularJS, AWS.

  8. 2017 – 2019
    Emerging Markets Consulting
    Software Engineer

    Proprietary software products and consultancy for energy trading platforms (Endur ecosystem). Java EE, Spring Boot, Oracle.

  9. 2016 – 2017
    Ipsos
    Junior Survey Developer

    Market research surveys on IBM SPSS Dimensions (mrScriptBasic). Deployment, QA, client support, and data delivery.

  10. Earlier career · pre-IT
    Bulgarian Navy & Merchant Navy
    Officer · Emma-class container vessels & VLCC tankers

    Operational leadership in high-stakes maritime environments. Decisions affecting vessel, cargo, crew, and the safety of the operation. MSc in Marine Navigation, 2004.

Differentiators

Why this engagement profile is uncommon.

D.01/04

Operational leadership origin

Leadership shaped in high-stakes maritime operations before software — not learned from a management book.

D.02/04

Spec-first AI delivery

AI used inside a disciplined engineering method — specifications, reviews, tests, production validation.

D.03/04

Enterprise stabilization track record

Comfortable owning complex applications under production pressure and bringing them back to stability.

D.04/04

Decisions under incomplete information

Capable of taking the correct decision when the picture is partial — and following through with disciplined corrective actions as new information emerges.

About

Svilen Yanovski.

Senior technical leader and full-stack software engineer based in Sofia, Bulgaria. Work spans specification, architecture, estimation, implementation, incident resolution, and team leadership.

Engineering depth in Java, Spring Boot, Quarkus, Angular, AWS, and enterprise data flows. Practical depth in planning, forecasting, logistics, and AI-assisted development.

Earlier career as a naval and merchant navy officer on Emma-class container vessels and VLCC tankers — the source of a leadership style built on responsibility, preparation, and trust under pressure.

Contact

Start a conversation about the engagement you are considering.

Initial conversations are direct and specific. Bring the problem, the constraints, and the people involved — we can move quickly from there.

svilen.yanovski@gmail.comLinkedIn