Zach Sykes

Full Stack Software Engineer | Forvis Mazars (Remote)

06/2023 – Present

Build and maintain production web applications and APIs serving enterprise users — owning architecture, delivery, reliability, and operational health across the full stack.

• Lead end-to-end feature delivery using React, TypeScript, Next.js, and .NET — from UI design through backend API implementation, cloud deployment, and production monitoring, with full ownership.
• Built a real-time collaborative platform (Planning Poker) as a reusable tool on top of internal infrastructure — independently architected and shipped from 0 to 1, including WebSocket infrastructure and backend services.
• Designed and established React/TypeScript component systems and API integration patterns adopted across multiple teams — improved consistency and developer velocity.
• Built and maintained CI/CD pipelines (GitHub Actions, Azure Pipelines) and production observability tooling (Grafana, Application Insights) — enabling safe, rapid releases and active incident response.
• Collaborated directly with product, design, and business stakeholders to translate requirements into shipped features — skilled at communicating technical tradeoffs and architectural decisions across disciplines.
• Mentored junior engineers on code quality, architecture patterns, and best practices — actively invested in raising team-wide technical standards.
• Integrate AI coding tools (GitHub Copilot, Claude) into daily engineering workflows — measurably improving delivery speed and enabling deeper focus on architecture and problem-solving.

Freelance Full Stack Engineer | Calathea Web Design · Selected client work (Remote)

2024 – Present

Part-time freelance practice outside full-time engineering work. Production websites and e-commerce for small-business clients — from requirements through deployment. Own UI/UX through implementation, including custom CMS creation when clients need tailored editorial workflows.

• Shipped multiple client sites end-to-end — e-commerce storefronts, musician and artist portfolios, movie promotion sites, and nonprofit WordPress builds.
• Own each engagement end-to-end: UI/UX, frontend implementation, backend integrations, custom CMS builds tailored to how clients actually publish content, and cloud deployment on Vercel.
• Built and launched calathea.design as a production Next.js application — same quality standard delivered to clients.
• Direct client communication from discovery through deployment and post-launch iteration.