Steven Stuart

Software Architect

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Professional Summary

Software architect with 15 years of experience bringing clarity to complex systems, from web and desktop applications to microservices and event-driven systems serving millions of users across hundreds of financial institutions. I hold principles shaped by years of building systems and learning what actually works. I share those principles through mentoring and governance that helps teams grow. And I deliver measurable results in systems that cost less, perform better, and evolve with the business.

Professional Experience

Team Lead / Senior Software Developer | SafetyChain | March 2026 – Present

Lead an engineering team responsible for rebuilding and maintaining a customer-facing Windows desktop application central to client record management. Collaborated with product and QA to keep the architecture aligned with evolving enterprise APIs and shared business logic across platforms.

Key Achievements:

Delivered in 4 months what had been stalled for two years, rescuing a legacy codebase and shipping a production-ready desktop application under a compressed deadline
Eliminated rework and plan drift by building a custom AI skill that enforced assumption validation before coding, producing structured task documents that captured intent, tested assumptions, and tracked progress for both active and historical reference
Cut AI coding costs and accelerated velocity by decomposing the codebase into single-responsibility components with a precise directory map, improving model accuracy on every code generation task and automatically maintaining the application’s technical guide as a byproduct
Resolved systemic performance and stability issues by migrating to a lightweight SQL data layer, fixing threading race conditions through a messaging pattern, and eliminating memory leaks through profiling and remediation
Reduced cloud costs by logging less and gaining more context by replacing blanket activity logging with deliberately authored observability, capturing only what mattered through structured logging and a local UI health indicator
Built the application’s first automated test suite from scratch using a use-case driven approach across all application layers

Technologies: WinUI3, .NET, C#, MVVM, Dapper, SQLite, Serilog, AI Assistants

System Architect | True Market Insiders — St. Petersburg, FL | Feb 2023 – March 2026

Led modernization of cloud infrastructure and development operations for a financial research platform. Directed architecture strategy, mentored the engineering team, and delivered secure, scalable solutions aligned with business objectives.

Key Achievements:

Reduced cloud costs 80% through infrastructure optimization and service consolidation, cutting complexity without sacrificing capability
Enhanced security posture with AWS WAF, zero-trust IAM policies, and compliant API architecture
Stabilized unreliable transaction architecture by redesigning service boundaries, improving reliability for sales operations and client-facing applications
Improved platform performance by rearchitecting the data layer with Aurora, DynamoDB, and Snowflake, reducing average API response time from over 1 second to 40ms and database CPU utilization from 85% to 10%
Introduced a Shape Up hybrid SDLC, organizing work around completed features rather than sprint intervals, cutting bug fix turnaround from months to days and feature delivery from weeks to days
Integrated AI-assisted code generation into development workflow, accelerating code deliverables by roughly 70% and nearly eliminating production defects in new feature releases
Accelerated deployment speed with CI/CD pipelines and automated testing environments, reducing production deployment time from 30 minutes to 5 minutes

Technologies: .NET 8, ASP.NET Core, AWS EKS, GraphQL (HotChocolate), Aurora PostgreSQL, DynamoDB, Snowflake, EventBridge, CloudFront, WAF, CodeBuild, Vue.js, Claude AI

Senior Software Engineer II | Alkami Technology — Plano, TX | Jul 2018 – Jan 2023

Built scalable microservices and event-driven systems for digital banking platform serving millions of users across 200+ financial institutions. Collaborated in Agile environment to deliver high-quality features while mentoring team members on architectural best practices.

Key Achievements:

Pioneered serverless architecture by developing Alkami’s first AWS Lambda-based APIs, establishing patterns adopted across engineering teams
Launched real-time notification platform enabling banks to deliver instant alerts to customers across web and mobile channels
Drove automated test quality and coverage across microservices, strengthening production reliability for a platform serving millions of banking customers

Technologies: .NET, ASP.NET Core, AWS Lambda, SQS, DynamoDB, SQL Server, Vue.js

Solutions Developer III | Cottonwood Financial — Irving, TX | Feb 2015 – Jun 2018

Developed enterprise applications for consumer finance operations. Led modernization initiatives to improve system architecture, enhance testability, and accelerate development velocity.

Key Achievements:

Delivered multi-location POS system using WPF, deployed to hundreds of retail locations nationwide
Improved system scalability by refactoring monolithic services into modular, independently deployable components
Reduced QA cycle time by building automated testing tools and establishing testing best practices

Technologies: .NET, ASP.NET, WCF, SQL Server, WPF, MongoDB

Tech Lead | DealerSpeedLeads — Dallas, TX | Mar 2011 – Feb 2015

Led full-stack development for a marketing technology SaaS platform. Architected scalable solutions, built automation systems, and established development processes.

Key Achievements:

Architected multi-tenant inventory platform supporting automotive, real estate, and e-commerce verticals with configurable data models
Built distributed automation system processing thousands of daily operations across customer accounts
Established deployment processes and delivered internal tools improving developer productivity

Technologies: .NET, ASP.NET, MySQL, WPF, WinForms, Selenium

Education

B.S., Computer Information Systems DeVry University — Irving, TX | Oct 2008 – Jun 2012