My career and search for new opportunities
I am a senior technology leader within the technology and engineering field. My interest in engineering was shaped by a childhood filled with Commodore 64, 8-bit video games, and endless experiments, tearing apart any equipment I could find and trying to put it back together again.
Education and Early Career
I did six years of university studies across three universities: Lund University, Malmö University, and Midsweden University. Straight after university, I started my first full-time software engineering position in a team that was creating the first national web-based e-prescription service.
Key Project:
- Developed the first national web-based e-prescription service, transforming how prescriptions were managed on a national scale, directly improving healthcare delivery.
Key Challenge:
- Understanding the healthcare domain as a junior engineer and designing a system that complied with strict regulatory and security requirements.
Sony Ericsson & Sony Mobile: Living the iPhone disruption
We are now in 2007, and at Sony Ericsson, a whole new world of global enterprise learnings opened up to me. After starting in application management, I went on to become a tech lead and later a domain architect. During this time, the introduction of the Apple iPhone led to downsizing and outsourcing of many of our colleagues. This meant that I worked with landscape simplification, sunsetting solutions and outsourcing many technical teams, mainly to Beijing, where I spent significant time on-site.
Key Projects:
- Tech Lead and Domain Architect: Drove architecture across multiple platforms during the industry’s rapid transformation.
- Led outsourcing efforts: Managed the transition of several technical teams to Beijing, ensuring continuity and efficiency.
Key Challenge:
- Managing the downsizing of teams amidst the global disruption caused by the iPhone while balancing new development with existing operations.
Achievements:
- Received the Sony Ericsson Recognition Award for stepping in during a crisis and bringing critical systems online when the usual staff was unavailable.
Read more: My journey at Sony Ericsson during the iPhone race and In our Beijing office, I gained some significant insights + Locked in the Glasgow office at midnight, with one functioning PC and growing hunger, we continued our search
Stretch Öresund: Entrepreneurship in consulting
After five years at Sony Ericsson, I decided it was time to explore new opportunities and joined Stretch Öresund, a consulting company in Malmö. Together with a few colleagues, I helped start the Software Solutions department, which focused mostly on Microsoft technology solutions based on .NET/C# and SharePoint. I spent significant time in assignments as code reviewer and also implemented distributed caching for to improve performance in key solutions.
Key Projects:
- Co-founded the Software Solutions Department: Played a central role in launching this department, focusing initially on healthcare tech solutions and later expanding into the automobile and financial sectors.
- Healthcare Deployments: Delivered healthcare solutions that gained national attention and were widely adopted in southern Sweden.
Key Challenge:
- Building a department from scratch and managing a wide variety of clients across healthcare, automotive, and finance sectors, all with different requirements and expectations.
Key Takeaway:
Technology isn’t just about code; it’s about understanding the broader system and how to serve people effectively.
More Reading: When our deploy filled hospitals and made the news and A discreet inquiry revealed they believed they had a unique custom solution, which, as it turned out, their competition now also possessed.
IKANO Bank: Standardizing in a complex world
I began consulting at the IKANO Group / IKANO Bank and later transitioned into an internal role as the domain architect for internet banking and mobile apps. This was a time of heavy restructuring and standardization as we sought to align the different markets under the same architecture.
Key Projects:
- Architect for Internet Banking and Mobile Apps: Led the restructuring of multiple markets into a unified architecture to streamline processes across IKANO Bank. Introduced abstraction layers to take pressure of the core banking system.
- DevOps Implementation: Introduced DevOps pipelines, improving development speed while ensuring compliance with the bank’s regulatory obligations.
Key Challenge:
- Balancing the need for innovation with the strict requirements of a highly regulated banking environment, particularly when integrating various market-specific systems into a unified architecture.
Key Takeaway:
Empowering development teams through DevOps not only improves efficiency but fosters a stronger sense of ownership and pride in the work.
IKEA Group: Building for scale and speed
When IKEA decided it was time to insource, I joined the IKEA Group as an Architect for the DevOps area, focusing on developer enablement, DevOps, automation, and CI/CD. I was later asked to setup and lead the Data & Integration unit and look at how to remove fulfillment tech constraints.
Key Projects:
- Cloud-Native capabilities: Led the development of a cloud-native data and integration capabilities, essential for supporting IKEA’s evolving omnichannel strategy.
- Data & Integration Unit: Founded the Data & Integration Unit, which focused on data platforms, API management, data pipelines, event management and much more. Rolled out the data mesh concept when capabilities matured.
- DevOps in a Box: Helped create a process to standardize DevOps practices across the organization, providing teams with autonomy while ensuring alignment with broader business goals.
- Fulfillment: Led a small team to look at constraints within fulfillment and omnichannel. Delivered optimization for store fulfillment and last mile delivery.
Key Challenge:
- Integrating legacy systems with new cloud-native platforms, all while managing a large-scale digital transformation that impacted teams across the globe.
Achievements:
- Led partnerships with global thought leaders, attended industry conferences, and represented IKEA at events such as Google Cloud Next in San Francisco.
Key Takeaway:
Balancing legacy systems with new innovations is key to maintaining agility while driving large-scale transformations.
More Reading: Company culture & goosebumps at IKEA Tech and Article on autonomous teams, the IKEA tech blog, written by me. + What Sweden needs is less talk and more ‘Goddammit, let’s do it!’ + In 2018, AI was not all that. + Google Cloud Next 2019 and Microsoft HQ
Edge Engineering: Innovating on the frontiers
Recognizing the need for focused innovation within IKEA Group, I proposed and founded Edge Engineering. This unit was designed to focus on experimental and emerging technologies that weren’t yet a priority in the core domains.
Key Projects:
- Edge Engineering Team: Built and led a small, agile team that focused on experimental technologies, driving innovation in areas that lacked dedicated focus within the organization. Reported into the CTO.
- Strategic Tech Acquisitions: Led the due diligence and integration of strategic tech acquisitions, contributing to IKEA’s broader digital strategy.
- Example of public available project, 3D as a Service: Created IKEAs first omnichannel enabled 3DaaS with native Google search integreation.
- Acted as corporate first responders to ease the burden of Covid-19 on our employees by enabling work from home, secure office policy etc.
Key Challenge:
- Operating on the “edge” of established systems, where the path forward wasn’t always clear, required careful balancing of experimentation and measurable results.
Achievements:
- Established systems and processes that continue to power parts of IKEA’s infrastructure today, with the Edge Engineering model inspiring other teams across the organization.
Key Takeaway:
Innovation often thrives at the edges of established structures, and small teams can drive significant impact if given the autonomy and resources to do so.
More reading: Keep it simple! Complicated systems and rules are a form of paralysis and By the time I left IKEA, CHECKA had helped distribute over 10,000 items to our colleagues. + Our colleagues in the store loved the idea. This was early COVID times, and they saw it as a real touchless time-saver.
StepStone Group: Building the future of work
In early 2021, the former IKEA Group CTO invited me to join StepStone Group as VP Engineering. I led the creation of the Emerging Technology unit, which explored the application of AI, data, augmented reality, and other cutting-edge technologies in recruitment.
Key Projects:
- AI Interviewers and Visual Job Finder: Developed groundbreaking tools in AI and AR to enhance the recruitment process, offering a more dynamic way for companies to find talent and for talent to find jobs.
- Emerging Technology Unit: Established this unit with teams in Malmö, Warsaw, and London, focusing on partnerships, developer relations, and tech acquisitions.
- Consolidation of platforms: I led the strategy work for architecture and software engineering to achieve platform and organisation consolidation.
Key Challenge:
- Navigating the complexities of integrating new technologies across multiple acquired markets while ensuring alignment with StepStone’s broader strategy.
Achievements:
- Showcased our innovations at internal and external conferences, earning recognition from the CEO and press coverage.
- Consolidated platforms, unifying both architecture and the digital organisations to optimize time to market.
Key Takeaway:
Embracing emerging technologies allows traditional industries to break through boundaries and create new ways of working.
What I’ve Learned Along the Way
Reflecting on my journey, a few key lessons stand out:
- Curiosity drives innovation: From disassembling electronics as a kid to leading AI projects in recruitment, curiosity has always been my driver for innovation.
- Empowered teams deliver the best results: Giving teams the autonomy to innovate within structured frameworks leads to faster, more meaningful results.
- Adaptability is key: The tech landscape is constantly shifting, and being able to adjust quickly is crucial for long-term success.
- Keep people at the core: Technology is a tool, but its true value lies in how it improves the lives of the people who use it. The same applies to the organisation. People over process.
Looking to the Future
As I seek my next opportunity, I’m excited to bring everything I’ve learned to a new challenge. Whether it’s with a startup or helping a large company through its digital transformation, I’m ready to make an impact. Let’s connect on LinkedIn and explore how we can collaborate!
Related Posts
Democratizing APIs with AI Assistance: A Step-by-Step Guide
Building something 100% with AI? Welcome sommarlistan.se
