Kristian Larsson Engineering Manager with a background in software engineering, data analysis, technical product & project management, and nuclear physics. Guides high-performing teams using agile methodologies, fostering growth and collaboration. Leverages technical expertise and a data-driven approach, informed by a diverse career journey, to align technical solutions with business objectives and deliver impactful results.

Experience

Engineering Manager | Smallpdf
Zurich | 2024 - Present

• Team Leadership and Development: Led, mentored, and managed a team of 3 backend engineers responsible for the development, maintenance, and scaling of core systems, including critical components like payments, subscription management, and authentication. Fostered a culture of continuous learning and professional development, resulting in promotions for all team members within the first year, demonstrating a commitment to individual growth and team success.
• Agile Transformation and Process Improvement: Drove the successful adoption of agile methodologies (Scrum/Kanban) within the Backend Engineering team. This transition fostered a more collaborative and iterative work environment, significantly improving team communication, project visibility, and overall project velocity. Implemented a dedicated project tracking system using GitHub Projects to enhance transparency and streamline project management processes.
• Strategic OKR Leadership and Alignment: Defined and championed quarterly OKRs for the Backend Engineering team, ensuring alignment with the company's North Star and strategic priorities while maintaining momentum on existing functionalities, fulfilling stakeholder requests, and proactively addressing technical debt.
• Subscription Management Optimization: Led the migration of Smallpdf's subscription management to a unified Recurly platform, enhancing system stability and reducing operational overhead.
• Payment Gateway Expertise: Managed integrations with multiple payment gateways, including Braintree, Adyen, and PayPal, ensuring a secure payment experience for customers.
• Cross-Functional Collaboration: Improved inter-team relationships and communication, fostering a more efficient work environment.

Technical Product Manager | Smallpdf
Zurich | 2021 - 2024

• Led roadmap and prioritisation: Steered backend, security, payments, infrastructure, and reliability initiatives.
• Enhanced security: Introduced Bug Bounty program, hardened accounts, mitigated ATO/DDoS attacks, hired Security Engineer, resulting in a significant reduction in security incidents.
• Improved team leadership: Maintained team productivity during company changes, led team through growth and division, balanced business-as-usual maintenance with new feature development.
• Introduced agile practices: Gradually transitioned team from Waterfall to shorter sprints and iterative project delivery, improving project velocity and customer satisfaction.
• Improved system reliability: Upgraded monitoring and implemented on-call procedures, reducing system downtime.
• Delivered impactful features: Rolled out new authentication to 16M MAU, enhancing user experience and security. Revamped deployment process to allow service-specific deployments, reducing average deployment time from 10 minutes to 8 seconds and empowering teams with increased autonomy.

Past experience

Technical Program Manager | Google
Zurich | 2019 - 2021

• Led diverse projects: Migrated teams to new auth flow, remediated WebView settings, restricted PII leaking applications, deprecated libraries, and more.
• Utilised data-driven approach: Leveraged data analysis to investigate issues, identify affected teams, and monitor project progress.
• Remediated vulnerabilities: Addressed internally discovered and externally reported vulnerabilities, mitigating security risks.
• Coordinated cross-functionally: Managed hundreds of stakeholders across different product areas, ensuring alignment and collaboration.
• Automated processes: Implemented full automation for monitoring and bug management, significantly improving efficiency.
• Enhanced team resources: Built a break-glass tool and improved documentation access, increasing productivity by 90%. Developed a functional proof of concept for a company-wide internal tool, which was approved and implemented as an internal tool.

Sr. Software Engineer | Reso
San Francisco | 2017 - 2019

• Built feature-parity e-commerce platform: Successfully led development in 3 months using Waterfall for initial version, then transitioned to Lean Startup for iterative feature delivery.
• Led product team and prioritised features: Worked closely with account managers to gather feedback and prioritise new features based on customer needs.
• Managed technical aspects: Oversaw code architecture, security, auth, payments, and database management.
• Mentored junior engineers: Hired and guided junior engineers, fostering their growth and development.

Software Engineer | Carta
San Francisco | 2016 - 2017

• Early employee at high-growth startup: Gained valuable experience working in a fast-paced environment.
• Full-stack development: Utilised Django, Python, React, and Postgres to build and maintain features.
• Learned Lean Startup principles: Gained insights into rapid iteration, technical debt management, and effective onboarding processes.

Additional Experience
2010 - 2014

• Data Analyst (IBM & Arvato Bertelsmann): Automated and improved reporting processes, remediated data issues, and created performance review tools.
• IT Project Manager (Artilabs Studio): Planned and executed IT infrastructure setup for a new office.
• Physics Research Assistant (GSI): Led parts of the experimental setup, including the installation, calibration, and review of a new micro-strip silicon detectors. Analyzed experimental data using C++ to provide evidence for the existence of ¹⁷Ne.

Education

M.Sc Physics | University of Gothenburg
Gothenburg, Sweden | 2002 - 2007