Software Engineer -- Backend Systems, Identity & Notification Platforms, Cloud Reliability

Nairobi, Kenya · joseph.gitau.c@gmail.com · LinkedIn · gitau.vercel.app

name: Joseph Gitau Chege
title: "Senior Software Engineer" 
superpowers:
  - Designing notification systems that actually deliver
  - Keeping 99.9% uptime without selling my soul
  - Explaining distributed systems without putting you to sleep
  - Automating everything except my coffee break
currently: Building auth & notification infra @ Steadfast Academy
vibe: "Systems thinker who ships"

Apr 2025 -- Present | Nairobi

Notification & Identity Infrastructure

• Built notification delivery capabilities in an in-house ERP -- push, in-app alerts, multi-channel across mobile & web. Basically my own mini Firebase.
• Implemented password login + on-device biometric auth, keeping 10,000+ student records safe.
• Built a real-time chat subsystem with presence, delivery, and read receipts. Because WhatsApp shouldn't be the only option.

Platform & Backend Engineering

• Architected a full-stack ERP consolidating student records, attendance, finance, and communication.
• Cut deployment errors by 45% and reclaimed 15h/week with Bash automation & CI/CD pipelines.
• Optimised Azure infra and cut cloud costs by 20% -- management was happy, my wallet was indifferent.

Reliability & Live-Site Ops

• 99.9% uptime delivered through proactive monitoring, maintenance, and incident response that won't make you cry.
• Containerised with Docker + Kubernetes -- 50% better uptime, 30% lower latency.
• 10TB+ high-availability storage on TrueNAS with redundancy & failover. RAID is my love language.
• Ubuntu Server & Debian administration -- service config, log analysis, OS-level debugging.

Leadership

• Led cross-functional engineering team; primary bridge between engineers and stakeholders.
• Built on-prem server & network infra from scratch -- cabling, switches, asset tracking. Yes, I have the scars.

Jan 2024 -- Mar 2025 | Kenya

• Solo-devved a full-stack school management system (C#, Python) -- records, finance, attendance, academic reporting.
• Built RESTful APIs and DB schemas (PostgreSQL/MySQL) that power daily operations.
• Saved staff 4h/week with automation scripts. They bought me chai. Worth it.
• End-to-end deployment & maintenance on cloud/on-prem.

Oct 2023 -- Dec 2023 | Kenya

• Built internal automation tools in C# and Node.js; refactored MySQL schemas -- 15% faster queries on critical financial reports.
• Maintained live production financial systems -- learned to make careful, well-documented changes in a high-accountability environment.

• In-House ERP -- Steadfast Academy (2024-2025) -- Full-stack ERP with notifications, messaging, and auth serving the entire institution.
• Notification & Auth Infrastructure -- Steadfast Academy (2025) -- Real-time push/in-app notifications + password/biometric auth for hundreds of daily active users.
• BetterFarm -- AgriTech Platform (2024) -- Cloud-native backend on Azure with real-time data pipelines and high-availability design.

B.Sc. Computer Science -- Umma University, Nairobi (2021-2024)
DSA, DBMS, Network Security, Operating Systems, Computer Architecture.