Position Spotlight: Supply Tech Engineer - Platform

In today’s Position Spotlight, Matteo, Senior Engineer on the Supply Tech team, discusses the focus and stamina needed in his role and how his team works together to manage and complete long-term projects.

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Can you please give us a brief summary of what your job entails?

As a Senior Software Engineer, I’m responsible for writing code to serve both our customers and our suppliers. However, I’m not just coding the entire day. I also help coordinate shared projects with other teams, plan new features or improvements, interview potential new team members, and onboard them once they join.  Once in a while, I’m on rotation for Ampelmann/Ampelfrau, which Malachi details in his post.

Has your role changed since joining GetYourGuide? If yes, how?

When I joined GetYourGuide two years ago I started on another team taking care of transactional emails and notifications sent to our customers to keep in touch with them while traveling. Shortly after, I moved to Supply Tech and I started working on a backend service used to integrate with our suppliers. The more I knew the company and my colleagues, the more I was able to contribute to other areas like hiring and internal standards around code quality and tooling.

What does an average day as a Supply Tech Engineer look like?

A day in our team starts with a stand-up meeting where each person informs the rest of the team of the wins and blockers from the previous day. Depending on the day, I might have meetings or interviews and, therefore, I plan some pomodoros around them to work on planned tasks, code reviews or help a fellow team member on a problem. Our weekly sprints run from Tuesday to Monday, therefore I try to dedicate Fridays to complete tasks and Monday to deploy anything that wasn’t ready into production.

What mission team are you on and what is its mission?

I’m currently working in Supply Platform which is responsible for building a scalable supply chain infrastructure in order to enable our suppliers to give customers easy access to excellent travel experiences. We work shoulder-to-shoulder with the Connectivity Tech/Ops team who ensure we have the products and availability customers demand by connecting with more attractions, pulling real-time availability, and providing a seamless booking experience through direct integration.

How would you describe the team’s working style and dynamic?

We work on long-term projects that set the foundation for operating our supply chain.  Therefore, we spend a good amount of time aligning all possible parties involved. We are always keen to help each other and we often ask for second opinions to get a different point of view.

What is the most challenging aspect of your role?

Long-term projects require focus and stamina. It’s easy to get distracted by less important things that might be found along the way, so focus is key. Stamina is needed because it takes a while to get the expected results you planned for at the beginning of the project. Software engineers are accustomed to short feedback cycles and that might not be the case with long-term projects.

What is the most rewarding aspect of your role?

Our team is working on tools and processes that are going to reshape an entire industry for years to come, and we work closely with our colleagues in connectivity to help our local partners better serve our customers.

What advice would you have for someone who would like to work as a Supply Tech Engineer at GetYourGuide?

Communication is very important on our team because we often interact with other people outside of the company. Therefore it’s very important to demonstrate you can clearly communicate as early as during the interview process.

What is your favorite thing about working at GetYourGuide?

GetYourGuide is currently working on many of the challenges present in the diverse market of tours & activities. Coming from a hospitality background, I see many similarities with the hotel industry, but with a different twist. At GetYourGuide I have found an environment filled with smart and diverse colleagues who have helped me take on many of these challenges.

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