Meet Marko! He is one of the first community members to join Symphony from Banja Luka, and he recently celebrated his first anniversary. Ever since he started his career, Marko was set on the DevOps path, working with large systems, infrastructures, and networks. Today, he continually discovers the dynamics of DevOps culture by learning, adapting, and exploring this ever-changing field. From his early days of working as an IT technician and System Engineer to evolving as a DevOps Engineer in Symphony, Marko shared his career journey with us.
Introduction to DevOps
Marko has been a part of the IT industry for over five years and he first started working as a System Integrator responsible for web hosting and maintenance. A role we can describe as the precursor to the DevOps role of today. At the time, the DevOps culture started to evolve rapidly, opening up new opportunities for acquiring knowledge and finding a position best suited to your needs and aspirations in this field.
In Marko’s own words - “With the onset of DevOps, the whole development life cycle was elevated to a new level with microservices, scalability, tools such as GitOps, GitHub, GitLab, etc., and the work became much more structured and painless. Communication between infrastructure and development became much easier with the Cloud and the automation of the continuous delivery process. Long story short - DevOps Engineers break down barriers between the engineering teams and infrastructure.”
Marko started working in Symphony as a DevOps Engineer on one of the biggest projects and reached a level of seniority while working with a variety of resources such as AWS, the entire CI/CD process, and using Terraform for Infrastructure as code. The project is known for detailed documentation, Git Flow, and architecture, and Marko is especially excited to work on a full microservice project. As he pointed out - “I believe that the key to continued success and good results is the tightly-knit partnership between the Solution Architect, Service Delivery Manager, Product Owner, and DevOps. I’ve had nothing but support and a helping hand every step of the way, and I was always given a chance to explain and implement my ideas throughout all the phases.”
The Symphony experience
Having come from a corporate environment, joining Symphony was a breath of fresh air for Marko. “The number one thing that I love about working here is flexibility, a trait the company nourishes and encourages in people as well. I have to give a special shout-out to the Office management, Community, and HR team that leave nothing to chance and always make sure our needs are met. Actively working on building trust, and giving us the freedom to cater our work to our needs as long as it is delivered on time is what I love most about our community.” - Marko emphasized.
Since his first work day, the Banja Luka community has grown to almost 30 members. Now, they will have a meeting place for work, hangouts, and various events and sessions with our new engineering office opening. Marko often met with the Banja Luka community for work and fun, but this is an excellent opportunity to elevate their relationship to the next level, with a place where they can come together, bond, and welcome new team members. You can read more on our decision to expand our outreach in Banja Luka here.
Thinking ahead
Talking about the future, Marko believes that there are still many parts of DevOps to explore and it is hard to keep up with all the novelties in this field. “I haven’t thought about taking on a managerial role yet but I really see myself going deeper into DevOps, microservices, infrastructure, and systems. The opportunities are endless.” - he added.
Marko is also an avid learner but also loves to share knowledge. Knowledge sharing is especially cherished in Symphony, and Marko mentioned the TechNote conference with Viktor Farcic as one of the best sessions he was lucky to attend and learn from. An interesting fact he shared with us is the Adriatic Valley Banja Luka Meetup community he founded together with a couple of friends, organizing meetups on the topics of software engineering, design, career paths, and personal development. The meetups had 80+ attendees each month, and it was a great chance for him to work on his presentational skills but also exchange experiences with people with similar interests.
When asked what value this experience brought to him, Marko said - “Sometimes you get too hard on yourself, thinking how any topic you pick has already been discussed in a million ways. However, when I held a meetup on the topic of security and Kubernetes clusters, it was something new and exciting, and everyone was eager to learn more and approached me afterward. It helped me realize how my perspective and experience can truly bring value to someone and vice versa, we can learn a lot from each other.”
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