Adfin | One year at Adfin: becoming a builder

🎉 One Year at Adfin: Becoming a Builder

One year ago, I leaped.

I felt stuck, creatively bored, and professionally underwhelmed at the time in my previous job. So when the opportunity to join a small group of passionate minds working on something bold came along, I didn’t hesitate (too much).

🚀 Joining a dream that was still in draft

When I joined Adfin, it wasn’t quite the company you see today. Back then, it felt more like a concept taking shape, with just a few determined people trying to bring to life the only platform that automates the end-to-end process of getting paid.

I was the first software engineer to join the team, outside of the founding members, essentially the first employee. That meant I wasn’t just another new hire; I was stepping into a pivotal role to help build the engineering foundation and turn big ideas into working realities.

What gave me confidence was the founding team itself. These weren’t just any colleagues; they were people I had worked with before, and deeply respected for their talent, clarity, and collaborative spirit. Their belief in this idea made it easy to believe in it too.

I knew it was a startup. I knew that meant risk.
But what I didn’t know was just how big the challenge and the growth would be.

🌀 My workflows crash course

When I joined Adfin, I had no background in workflows honestly, I didn’t even know what a workflow engine did. Concepts like orchestration, BPMN, or async execution weren’t on my radar. But suddenly, they were my responsibility.

That’s when I met our tool of choice for orchestrating processes. I dove in headfirst, reading, experimenting, asking questions, breaking things (and fixing them). It was intense, but incredibly rewarding.

Within the first month, we had a fully functional workflow in place, one that could autonomously schedule tasks and send notifications. Looking back, it’s still wild to me how fast that came together, especially considering how unfamiliar it all was on day one.

🧠 From unknowns to ownership

Workflows quickly became my main focus, and what a deep, fascinating world I had stepped into.

I had never owned a project with so many moving parts and unknowns. Every day brought something new to figure out:

Asynchronous job execution and scheduling
Transactional boundaries and propagation in relational databases
Design and orchestration of process definitions using BPMN engines

None of it was familiar. All of it had to be built from scratch. But challenge by challenge, line by line, I was learning. Some days felt like steady progress. Others felt like creative chaos, in the best way.

Along the way, my Java skills sharpened, my technical confidence grew, and my mindset shifted from “I need to figure this out” to “I can build this.” This wasn’t just about shipping a feature; it was about designing a system from the ground up that would become a cornerstone of our product.

🤝 The people who made it worth it

As a team, we’ve been through ups and downs, as has Adfin. We’ve faced our share of challenges, no doubt but we made it through them together.

Yes, there were long working days. Yes, there were weekends away from family. But through it all, it always felt worth it because I believed in what we were building, and even more, I believed in who I was building it with.

I’ve learned something from each of my colleagues every single day. And I want to give some special shout-outs:

To Ciprian, for believing in me from day one, giving me space to grow, and always being there to listen even when things got messy.
To Andra and Silviu, for their unwavering patience, true camaraderie, and constant readiness to jump in, guide, and support, no matter how busy things got.
And Florin, who somehow knows everything, always has the answer to even my most complicated questions and never makes me feel silly for asking the simple ones.

It’s a rare thing to be surrounded by people who lift you, challenge you, and support you at the same time. I don’t take that for granted.

🏁 One year in and still running

A year later, I’m still running that marathon. The team has grown. The product is real. The mission is clear. And me? I’ve gone from cautiously curious to fully committed.

It hasn’t always been easy. But it has always been worth it.

I’m proud of what we’ve built. I’m grateful for the trust the team placed in me. And I’m excited (and maybe a little nervous in the best way) to see what Year Two has in store.

So here’s to a year of growth, grit, and great people.
And to the next phase of the journey, whatever workflows it brings. 😉

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One year at Adfin: becoming a builder

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