About me
Hands-on technical lead and fullstack developer with 15+ years across agency, founder and international consulting work. I combine day-to-day implementation with responsibility for application architecture, technical direction and engineering practices.
I work across PHP, JavaScript and TypeScript ecosystems, defining stack choices, project structure and backend / API / frontend boundaries while continuing to build, review and maintain production code alongside the team.
My focus also includes improving how engineering teams work: reusable project foundations, development standards, Docker-based environments, CI/CD, automated deployment, observability and disciplined AI-assisted engineering.
Work experience
Lead Developer — CBTW · via STEPHANZYCH
Brussels, Belgium · 2023 – Present
Hands-on lead developer in the technical team that came out of the Cherry Pulp integration, currently four to five engineers. I develop day to day while owning technical direction and progressively modernising the team's engineering and delivery practices.
Technical leadership & application development
- Own architecture and technical decisions across concurrent projects: stack choices, project structure, and backend / API / frontend boundaries
- Develop and maintain production applications alongside the team rather than operating as an architecture-only role
- Define technical standards, development conventions and code review practice, and drive their adoption across projects
- Review implementation, resolve technical issues and support developers through day-to-day technical guidance
- Maintain and evolve shared project tooling and boilerplates originally built at Cherry Pulp and still used within CBTW
- Work across distributed international teams, including enterprise environments using Microsoft internal tooling and AWS
- Introduced a shared Docker local development environment using Traefik, PHP, MariaDB and phpMyAdmin as the common baseline for projects
- Building GitLab CI pipelines and secured containerised deployment on AWS Lightsail, replacing manual and FTP-based deployment and moving off Laravel Forge
- Adding observability with Grafana, Prometheus and Loki
- Roll out modernised workflows project by project alongside ongoing client delivery, allowing legacy systems and new delivery practices to coexist during transition
Co-Founder / CTO / Head of Frontend — Cherry Pulp
Brussels, Belgium · 2013 – 2024 · acquired by CBTW in 2023, transition completed in 2024
Co-founded Cherry Pulp and helped grow it into a digital agency of around 20 people building custom websites, digital platforms and web applications. My role evolved from frontend leadership into company-wide technical ownership while remaining directly involved in implementation and delivery.
Scale & engineering leadership
- Delivered 200+ web platforms and digital products
- Helped grow the company from 4 to 20 people
- Supported and mentored development teams, up to 10–12 developers at peak
- Defined technical standards, project conventions and development practices used across teams
- Took part in technical hiring, onboarding and developer progression
Architecture & hands-on delivery
- Defined technical direction and project architecture across client work: stack selection, project structure, and the boundaries between WordPress or Laravel backends, APIs and JavaScript frontends
- Owned frontend technical direction and remained hands-on in the delivery of short-cycle web projects
- Designed a modular web delivery approach around Docker, WordPress with Bedrock, structured conventions and custom Forge / Lightsail deployment workflows
- Established reusable boilerplates, conventions and CLI tooling that made project setup faster and maintenance predictable over time
- Led technical scoping, estimation and client-facing technical advisory through discovery and delivery
- Balanced architectural decisions with commercial constraints, team capacity and project delivery requirements
Representative clients: Unicef · Oxfam · Engie · Delhaize · Telenet · KBC Brussels · Latour & Petit · Cefic · Business Europe · Clear Channel · Monizze · Solidaris · eFarmz · RTL · RTBF
