Adventure of software engineering
Solve development problems and mentor others
Software Engineering
Home Office, Munich
IT & Development
Jochen Schweizer mydays GmbH
Tune in to hear from Katja and Francisco of the Software Development Department at Jochen Schweizer mydays Group (JSMD).
Katja greatly values the emphasis on the seamless integration of UI/UX design in her role.
Having previously worked in a highly hierarchical company, Francisco was pleasantly surprised to discover the efficacy of shared leadership.
Their most significant ongoing project is the merger of the webshops of Jochen Schweizer and mydays.
The challenge is to synchronize design and function while prioritizing UI/UX, all while transitioning from old technology to new.
By the way, there's a real slide and a bouldering wall in the JSMD office, symbolizing the adventure of software engineering.
If you're interested in joining the team, click directly on the button and you will reach the career page of JSMD Group
Transkript vom Jobcast
Jobcast Adventure of software engineeringFrancisco: At the beginning there was no tech lead. Basically, the leadership in the teams were shared. That was a really good surprise for me that that can work.
Alex [OHRBEIT]: Hello. Hello. This is Alex from OHRBEIT. In this jobcast, you will get to know two people from the software development department of Jochen Schweizer mydays - JSMD in short. Before you hear backend engineer Francisco, you will first get to know Katja, who mainly takes care of the frontend.
Katja: What I really enjoy here is the involvement of UI and UX in the actual teams. Specifically for the frontend, because a lot of the times it's not taken into account as much. And here it's the active interaction between the engineers and UI and UX to like find the best solution and that brings out the best user experience.
Francisco: I was coming from a very hierarchical idea organization, and when I joined at the beginning, there was no tech lead. Basically, the leadership in the teams were shared. That was a really good surprise for me that that can work. Also how agile. Because many companies, they mention that they work in a in an agile manner or taking an agile approach, but it's rarely lived. And here we are not perfect for sure, but at least we acknowledge things are not working and we have the freedom to change.
Alex [OHRBEIT]: The biggest project for them at the moment is the merger of the two webshops, Jochen, Schweizer and mydays in one common platform. Katja will now tell you what they are doing to achieve this.
Katja: That included some of the work in the frontend and also in the backend. We included UX and UI researchers and designers. We implemented a design system both on the UI side but also like on our side. And with this we also looked at microservices in our frontend, meaning that a page could be split up into different areas, then implemented this and typescript and react. Though some of the older services might still have JavaScript in it.
Alex [OHRBEIT]: So the team is also using this project for replacements of older technologies. Now we will talk about other highlights from this project and you will hear what is particularly challenging for them.
Francisco: A big milestone for us (was) to have this both shops running in the same platform. So we time every new feature, every new integration to another system. For example, we use Algolia for search that have proven quite successful for Jochen Schweizer. We can develop features and benefit both platforms. What has been challenging latest month is to integrate SAP within our new platforms and make it available for content managers to complete product information, set up campaigns, set up pages. It's been challenging because of tight deadlines that we have. So one of the things we have to do is divide our work in different phases. So from the idealistic point of view that we want to do things into divided, okay, how we can achieve this deadline and produce value much earlier and then keep working towards that North Star that we have in our architecture. So we're going to be successful, but it's at the same time quite exciting.
Katja: Maybe also being a woman in IT... I've always been told: Okay, you need to show your work. You need to also show that what you can do! But I've actually had to look back a little bit and encourage other people because it's not just about me putting myself first. It's more about essentially being a servant leader.
Alex [OHRBEIT]: Before I close by handing off to Francisco and Katja again, I recommend that you check out JSMD careers page in more detail if you would like to bring your software development skills to the table there. You can also show your interest via the OHRBEIT website without a resume, by the way! The best way to do this is to go to the shortlink jobcast.de/jsmd. Now to the end: Francisco and Katja, your turn again!
Francisco: There is this change that we want to become more product and customer focused company. Assess the feedback that we get. Experiment more. It's easy to say, but it requires a lot of moving parts to adapt and it will take some time. But I think we we're going to be able to improve.
Katja: Like bringing the whole platform forward and creating essentially something amazing here. And the amount of people around you are just so positive about it. And yeah, I really love that. And from time to time, like we would sit together for a beer, we have bouldering sessions, where people would meet up to spend some time together or even we have a slide in the office to just go for a slide ...
Francisco: Yeah, that's great...
Katja: ...like create the adventures even inhouse. So that's really, really cool!
Jobcast End: Adventure of software engineering