Working with Gemeente Almere was less “first gig” and more “deep dive into real world tech challenges where you learn to swim with infrastructure sharks (in a good way).”
Officially, Almere is one of the younger, fastest-growing municipalities in the Netherlands — built from scratch on reclaimed land in the Flevoland polder. It's a place where innovation meets everyday life, and that's exactly the kind of environment where my role didn't just sit in a cubicle — it moved things forward.
For seven years, I served as Client Lead Engineer, placed by Fujitsu, acting as the technical counterpart between client teams and engineers of all stripes. If there was a bridge needed — metaphorically or technically — I was probably on it. 🚧
Client Lead Engineer
begin - end
From day one, I became the go-to person for questions that straddled the line between “business wants outcome” and “systems need logic”. That meant:
Being the primary technical voice for both client stakeholders and internal engineering teams.
Keeping infrastructure stable, available, and performing (yes, uptime matters).
Making sure the people building systems and the people depending on them understood each other — like translating binary into human.
The teamwork here was real — often with architects, consultants, application teams, and change-management groups all in the same room (or Teams call).
Infrastructure Modernization
2019
Led a complete rebuild of the municipality's Hyper-V and S2D environment to create a stronger,
more scalable foundation for office systems, applications, and virtual workspaces. In plain speak:
Rebuilt the virtualization backbone.
Made core systems stronger, more scalable, and far less prone to unexpected hiccups.
Remote Work Makeover
2020
Then came that year — you know the one global lockdowns. Suddenly, everyone needed stable, secure remote access,
and the existing setup was like a bike in a bike race. So we:
Super-sized network performance.
Boosted Citrix from supporting ~400 users to ~2,600.
Tweaked virtualization layers so everything stayed quick and responsive.
It taught me more than any textbook could — about infrastructure, collaboration,
and why IT engineers sometimes need to speak human first, system language second.
Process & Change Management
2020 - 2022
Collaborated with client teams and internal experts to refine workflows for requests and changes. Because tech isn't just hardware and code — it's people and how they work together.
I focused on efficiency and clarity while preserving existing contracts, enabling smoother cooperation without contractual friction.
Streamlined change and request processes.
Made sure client priorities were respected and internal teams could deliver without stumbling over bureaucracy.
All without rewriting contracts or changes to current DAP agreements (because nobody really loves paperwork).
Migration & Decommissioning Support
2024 - 2026
As the engagement neared its end, I helped guide a seamless transition to the next vendor.
This included consolidating infrastructure documentation, preparing legacy environments,
and coordinating hybrid operations to support both outgoing and incoming teams. Privacy,
data integrity, and configuration accuracy were top priorities.
