Tiilon Konlan

Lead Software Engineer with 4+ years of hands-on experience building, scaling, and operating mission-critical education and institutional systems. I design and maintain student management systems, HRIS, clinic and IT asset platforms used by staff and students across multiple campuses. Strong full-stack background (Django, PHP, React) with production experience in containerization, Kubernetes orchestration, CI/CD, and automation (Jenkins, Docker, Zapier, n8n).

Experienced in leading small engineering teams, mentoring junior developers, executing data migrations, and delivering robust, compliant production systems.

Lead Software Engineer - Academic City University - Accra, Ghana

(2024-02)

• Lead the engineering team responsible for the institution's core platforms: Student Management System (SMS), HRIS, Clinic Management, and IT Asset Management.
• Developed architecture, roadmap, sprint planning, and technical reviews; delegate implementation and mentor 2+ developers.
• Implemented and maintained CI/CD pipelines (Jenkins) and Kubernetes orchestration to support staging environments; established automated image builds and deployments.
• Drive requirements gathering with academic and administrative stakeholders to translate business needs into technical specifications and prioritized features.
• Championed automation for admin workflows using Zapier and PDFMonkey (e.g., automated offer letters, payment receipts), reducing manual processing effort and human error.
• Conduct regular training sessions for staff and students, improving platform adoption and reducing support tickets.

Software Engineer - Academic City University

(2023-07 - 2024-02)

• Designed and implemented student management system major features: student intake workflows, semester registration, timetable access, lecturer grading uploads, and transcript & certificate generation modules.
• Built HRIS modules for leave application, performance reviews, and staff surveys; implemented role-based access and audit logging.
• Developed clinic management functions for patient record capture, retrieval, and basic reports used by campus health staff.
• Integrated payment and document generation workflows using third-party APIs and server-side automation tools.

Database Administrator - Academic City University

(2022-07 - 2023-07)

• Acted as primary data contact for administrative departments: handled ad-hoc data requests, queries, and exports used in reporting and decision-making.
• Investigated and triaged user-facing issues in the student management platform; coordinated fixes with developers and communicated status to stakeholders.
• Performed regular database maintenance, backups, and assisted in database schema updates during feature rollouts.

Intern (full-stack / platform developer) - Openlabs

(2022-01 - 2022-07)

• Built and maintained attendance registration platforms and simple program websites primarily using PHP; supported the lead developer on institution projects.
• Internship served as a probationary period to validate self-taught development skills and deliver production-capable features.

Lead Software Engineer (contract / part-time) - Openlabs & BlueCrest (Ghana & Liberia)

(2024-10)

Ongoing support prior to lead role

• Developed the custom student management platform for Openlabs and led the BlueCrest branches' platform work.
• Led data migrations from Knack to a custom PHP-based platform (BlueCrest GH - Dec 2023; BlueCrest Liberia - Dec 2024).
• As lead, I guide development, delegated tasks to a junior developer, and ensured platform stability and continuity across branches.
• Applied automation to admissions and administrative processes, integrating payment gateways and automated document generation.

Full-Stack Developer - Freelance

(2018)

Selected public project

• MaitriseTCF (maitrisetcf.com) - Online practice and exam platform for TCF Canada preparation. Built with Django and React; integrated Paystack and Stripe for subscription-based access. Implemented role-based access, timed practice exams, and subscription enforcement.
• Other NDA-bound internal systems built for SMEs and institutions (operations, reporting and workflow automation).

BSc (Hons) - Marketing - University of Professional Studies, Accra (2013 - 2017)

Business - St. Augustine's College, Cape Coast (2009 - 2013)