Harsh Kotak

Harsh Kotak

This is my personal blog, where I share my thoughts about various subjects, and what I'm learning. I hope that you'll like the content.

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About me

Hi there 👋, I’m Harsh Kotak! I am an experienced engineering leader currently working at Dun and Bradstreet. I’m also currently pursuing my Master’s degree in Computer Science from Georgia Tech with a specialization in Machine Learning.

If you have questions, or just want to chat, you can reach out to me on LinkedIn.

🤖🤖🤖CLICK HERE to chat with an AI CHATBOT to learn more about my work experience.🤖🤖🤖

Work Experience

DUN & BRADSTREET - Director of Engineering
  • Headed e-commerce teams to build event driven applications in Java Spring and Python Flask frameworks that enabled offline and online sales of 3 new products across 11 markets bringing in additional $18MM in revenue.
  • Led engineering teams to reduce the total cost of cloud ownership by 70% for several workloads by modernizing the legacy deployment infrastructure and coordinating the migration to Kubernetes orchestrated containers.
  • Secured PCI compliance for e-commerce applications by collaborating with external auditors and engineering teams to gather required evidence and enhance operational processes as needed.
  • Instituted best DevOps practices in the teams by mandating infrastructure as code using Terraform/AWS CDK/AWS Cloudformation resulting in increased deployment speed by 50% due to automation.
  • Established SLOs for the applications and monitored the MTTx metrics to track the objectives, including a 99.99% availability (4 nines) for supported applications, by creating dashboards in New Relic and Splunk.
  • Organized cross-team technical reviews to cultivate a culture of knowledge sharing within the organization.
  • Managed budget and financial forecasts for engineering efforts and projects, ensuring compliance with organizational requirements.
DUN & BRADSTREET - Principal Software Engineer
  • Led team of 8 engineers to deliver MyDnB application programmed in React/Typescript framework within a record 5-month timeframe by engaging in the entire application development life cycle, from early-stage design and prototyping to delivering product releases.
  • Built a React/Typescript based self-service web application for customers to apply for DUNS number upon purchasing a paid product reducing the product fulfillment time by 50% and improving the revenue recognition rate by 30%.
  • Recruited engineers to build and maintain a highly engaged and productive engineering team.
DUN & BRADSTREET - Senior Software Engineer
  • Developed new features and components in Adobe Experience Manager CMS for the DNB.com business directory serving over 120 million company records by leading a team of 5 software engineers and 2 QA engineers through the agile development process.
  • Split traffic and conduct AB Tests using Adobe Target and Sitespect, to verify user engagement, using metrics such as click-through rate, page views, and bounce rate among others.
  • Created an automated CI/CD pipeline with Jenkins, Terraform and Saltstack, reducing artifact build times by 33% and deployment times by over 50%, improving the team’s productivity.
  • Performed periodic code reviews to ensure code readability, maintainability, and code consistency.
THE JM SMUCKER COMPANY - Senior Software Engineer
  • Designed and built new digital experiences for 4 Smucker’s Family Brands - Folgers Coffee, Dunkin Donuts, Sahale Snacks and Pillsbury website redesign on PHP based PimCore CMS.
  • Created a Smart Label portal that increased consumer engagement by 18% and helped consumers learn about allergen, nutrients and ingredient information about their purchase through the use of QR codes.
  • Led the implementation of a marketing consent portal that enabled EU users to opt in/out of marketing communications and request to delete their data, in compliance with the new GDPR regulation.
WEBLAYERS TECHNOLOGIES PRIVATE LIMITED - Startup Founder
  • Founded a company that developed web applications for SME businesses. Developed 8 brand websites, generated over $10k in revenue and grew the business to 4 team members within the first year.
  • Expanded the business by building a PHP based Magento ecommerce marketplace with a team of 3 engineers from scratch to reach over 100,000 monthly visitors and $200,000 in revenue during FY 2015-2016.
  • Programmed an ERP web application using Java Servlets and JSP with responsive bootstrap framework to automate business processes.
  • Managed trading operations of goods from China and channeled online sales of procured products using Snapdeal, Flipkart, and Amazon India.
  • Reduced product return rates by 15% through a series of product and process improvements.
  • Prepared income statements, tax statements, balance sheets and projected cash flow using Tally accounting software.