Welcome to another edition of Vaimo Introducing where we’ll be catching up with Konrad who’s based at Vaimo’s Centre of Excellence in Wroclaw, Poland. Listen in to hear what Konrad had to say about life as a programmer, AEM and the Vaimo values!

Hi Konrad and welcome to Vaimo Introducing! Given your role as an AEM Developer, can you tell us a little bit about how you developed a specialism in this area and how it brought you to Vaimo?

Back when I was studying, I knew that I wanted to work in the world of programming and AEM was just an area that stood out to me. I realised that there were lots of opportunities in AEM and interesting projects to work on. I started working with AEM back in 2012, and am still doing so.

My initial AEM experience was working on websites for several global businesses, mainly in the banking sector. This was a great experience for me but in the back of my mind, I was looking for a role where I could have more direct involvement in an overall company AEM strategy. And that’s what led me to Vaimo!

What is it about AEM particularly that excites you?

At first glance, AEM is effectively an enterprise CM system. But if you go deeper, there are so many more services that can be connected. There’s a comprehensive pack of features that businesses can benefit from, for example, targeting, newsletters and Adobe Experience cloud services.

I also like the fact that it’s easy to write your own extensions for this platform and you can customise as needed. Plus it’s Java-based too, so there’s a huge and active community around the language. At Vaimo, our team gets the opportunity to put all this together to build AEM solutions from scratch, which is exactly what I wanted to do.

Were you always destined to work as a developer, or did your path change course?

I studied computer science so this was my direction all the way from high school. And once my career started, I realised that this was the right path for me—there are so many possibilities for development and progression, and you get to work on the projects that mean something to you.

With many possibilities out there, what was it that brought you to Vaimo?

Working previously with global banks, I knew I wanted a role in a slightly smaller company that was also based in the IT industry. I joined Vaimo because I can work with a wide range of clients across the world. So in terms of AEM, this gives me more opportunities to experience the platform in new ways. I also have the chance to contribute to Vaimo’s AEM business-level strategy and take part in these discussions which is a major plus for me.

What are you most proud of in your time here so far?

I’m proud that in the last 8 months we’ve managed to build and establish a solid AEM team at Vaimo—something I was happy to be involved with in terms of the recruitment process. I’m also proud of the service we offer our clients in talking through the technology and advising on their architecture. Overall I’m just really happy with the direction we’ve taken which has had a positive impact on our clients.

Since the outbreak of COVID-19, we’ve all had to change our working behaviours. Can you tell us how it’s been working remotely and how your team has adapted?

I think every team member is affected by the current situation differently, but in general our team is doing really great. We are a fully remote team anyway with team members in Poland, Ukraine and Estonia. We’ve managed to deliver a big part of our current project as expected and our development has not slowed down at all.

Speaking for myself, I can say that I miss working from the office because I like to meet people every day. In my case I’ve had to establish a new daily routine and clearly separate working time from the rest of the day. Although, I need to admit that working from home has many advantages too, eg. time saved on travelling to the office, eating home-made food or wearing more comfortable clothes 🙂

Is there an app you can’t live without?

It would have to be Signal, the open-source, encrypted messaging tool. It was founded on the premise of protecting online privacy and hides virtually all metadata. This means only the person who the message is being sent to can see who sent it to them.

Signal has no way of telling who is sending you other messages. Out of all the messaging platforms, this is definitely one of the most secure messaging applications. Online privacy is something I’m interested in, so I’d recommend checking it out if you don’t know Signal.

Can you describe Vaimo in 4 words?

I’d have to go with Vaimo’s values: Excellence, fun, teamwork and open. I’ve seen these values on show in my team and across the company, so Vaimo is definitely living its values!

A big thanks to Konrad for taking some time out to talk all things Vaimo and AEM.Stay tuned to our blogto hear more stories from Vaimoers across our global offices!