Case Study: Scaling an Eng Org to 700

Lucian Popovici played a key role in the establishment of Deloitte Digital Romania, where he was the Director of Engineering for six years. In that time, he successfully grew the team to over 700 IT engineers across multiple locations in Romania. Popovici has over two decades of experience in the tech industry, having scaled engineering organizations at major companies like Ericsson and Deutsche Bank before his time at Deloitte Digital. He is now the founder of Bridging Innovation, an enterprise strategy advisory and AI consultancy. He also founded Bridging Gaps, a pro bono mentoring community with over 80 senior tech leaders who have provided more than 3,000 hours of free mentoring to hundreds of professionals in Romania. In a recent podcast, Popovici discussed his transition from a Java developer to an engineering director, sharing that a key lesson was moving beyond a "control freak" mindset and embracing a leadership style focused on empathy. He advocates for flatter organizational structures over hierarchical ones. He has also commented on how AI is changing team structures, suggesting that it could reduce team sizes by half and is impacting the demand for junior developer roles. Popovici has noted that in some cases, 85% more time is now spent on code reviews than on writing the initial code. Popovici is a proponent of the Romanian IT industry shifting its focus from outsourcing to developing its own products and consultancy services. This perspective aligns with a broader trend of developing deeper, more specialized engineering capabilities. Deloitte Digital's growth strategy often includes the acquisition of specialized firms to enhance its engineering and product development capabilities. This approach allows for the rapid integration of new skills and teams, which is a common strategy for scaling in the consulting industry.