I was born in 1987, Mezokovesd, Hungary, a little rural town with a bit less than 20.000 people. It turned out very early, that I am good at solving, and more importantly, like mathematics problems. Beside that with my friends we used to run and play a lot of soccer. Really, tons of.
After reaching teen years, my mom recommended a school, which is not only known for high quality education, but for building other human values. I applied, got approved, and decided to start the September there. It was Benedictine High School of Pannonhalma in 1999, I was 12.
Heading to Pannonhalma for first year, Mezokovesd, Hungary, 1999
To be honest, I cannot say it was easy to live and learn in a dormitory, 300 kms away from home with 35 unknown boys at first, but fortunately I made many friendships very soon, and after getting used to the strict rules and the continuous presence of monks, it became a Hogwarts-like feeling with many opportunities to grow. Now I consider it one of my most decisive experience in my whole life. I wouldn’t do it any differently and never change this 6 years for anything.
In 2005 I graduated from high school and went to Budapest University of Technology and Economy for learning computer science engineering. After third semester I started working as web developer and as managing editor of an online portal in parallel. In 2008, with a financial step-back, I could join to a well-built trainee program of CIB Bank, because I realized, that this industry cannot be learnt from books, and hands-on experience is mandatory. After 6,5 years of various technical roles in CIB, I felt that challenges facing day-to-day were not making my eyes shining anymore, but in the meanwhile my leadership ambitions gradually came into view. These two together marked the way to transform myself from an engineer to engineering manager. The process is still ongoing even after 6 years, and I believe it – like a house in the suburb – cannot be finished. I learn and try my best every day to be a better listener of my guys.
“What a beautiful cat, you are, Sanyi”
Before applying for team leader positions, I already managed and coordinated my colleagues, asked for their opinions, motivated them, and worked together to reach organizational and personal goals, so I wasn’t surprised as much as in the picture above, when my application was approved. Since then I managed 3 teams, small and big ones (20+ people), but now, and this is what I am most proud of, I’d been leading DevOps Engineering for 2+ years, built it absolutely from ground-up. Since 2021 I’ve been working for Danubius IT Solutions as Delivery Team Lead, Head of DevOps and as a shareholder too. If you are interested in these career steps and achievements, please, check my Linkedin page. As James D. Watson, the co-author of the academic paper proposing the DNA molecule in 1953 said:
If you are the smartest person in the room, you are in the wrong room.
I’m definitely not in that situation luckily, couldn’t wish for better, well-educated colleagues and team members. To maintain and increase my IT knowledge next to daily hands-on experience, I consider Codecademy, Coursera, Udemy, Harvard edX, Pluralsight, etc. an invaluable and great online opportunity to search topics you are interested in, and willing to learn about. But not everything is about studying and working.
Most of my free time I spend with my wonderful wife, Nóri, and my friends, travelling and getting to know different regions and countries, but beside that, I run, ride bicycle, read a lot, host kultúr sufni, a Hungarian, weekly published podcast and volunteer on Kiva and Élelmiszerbank with collecting sustainable food for indigent children and their families. In the following video I participated in a ~110km long race in Austria, struggling to the top of Puchberg am Schneeberg as third mountain in a row in 2015.
I have so many plans for the future, and always need to keep in mind, what Steve Jobs said once:
Focus is about saying no.
Everything cannot fit into your life, you need to find the right balance, the so called golden middle way. This is what I work on every single day.
If you think we may have common interests and open for a chat, feel free to drop me a line.