What’s it like to work in CARDO AI

Are you wondering what’s it like to work in Cardo AI? Are you thinking about whether this could be the right workplace for you? If that’s the case, in this article you will find everything you need to know about the talent experience in Cardo AI.

We interviewed some of our team members and summed up their thoughts about working in Cardo AI, from the work culture to the benefits that the company offers. Keep on reading to discover life at Cardo AI.

Cardo AI: A growing fintech

If I had to describe Cardo in one word, it would be movement. Everything has been moving since the very first day and hasn’t stopped evolving. We have never been bored of anything. We always had new ideas to implement, new projects, new people to bring in, new offices to open.

Klajdi – Team Lead

The fintech industry is a very dynamic and innovative field, and so is Cardo AI. We are constantly evolving and are becoming one of the fastest-growing companies in Europe. 

We were recognized as one of the top 20 European scale-ups by EIT Digital (leading European digital innovation and entrepreneurial programs) in 2021 by the European Commission. Furthermore, we won first place at the European Big Data Value Forum.

When I joined Cardo, there were about 20 people at the company. However, I could clearly see the passion towards building the best products in the market. 

Now we’re more than 100 employees and have three amazing products. We are growing a lot, but so is our level of passion and commitment towards technology.

Xhoana – Business Analyst

What is it like to work in Cardo?

The goal of Cardo AI is to give employees the best possible environment to work and feel at their best.

How do we ensure that? Here are some of the key elements we focus on at Cardo and that we offer to our team members:

1. Remuneration package

We’re looking for the best talents to join the company and help us develop great products. That is why one of our most important values is ‘Excellence’. 

We offer a very competitive salary and, besides that, we also give the opportunity to take part in a stock option plan. What does this mean in practice? That you’ll have the chance to become part of the ownership of the company and become a real shareholder of Cardo. 

2. Make a real impact

At Cardo, all employees have the chance to make a real impact. 

Every day, our products are making a difference for our clients, empowering them to make better investment decisions. Our teams interact with customers and clearly see the contribution they are making with their work. Plus, everyone is actively involved in the development of new products and initiatives! We are radically changing the way private markets are operating, and by joining Cardo, you can be part of it. 

We are all problem solvers. Regardless of your experience, everyone’s opinion is heard. 

It doesn’t matter if you’re a junior, or if you just joined cardo. Your opinion and ideas will matter.

Klement – Back-End Engineer

3. Solve complex challenges

One of the things our employees value the most about Cardo is the fact that here, you can tackle highly complex problems related to the private debt market. The complexity derives from the fact that we have our own products and that we follow their development from the initial idea to the implementation and rolling out of the solution. This means we have to continuously improve them, thinking about better architecture, in order to be scalable and include new features along the way. 

As a Senior in Software Engineering, I like to tackle complex challenges, implement new solutions, and to continuously experiment with unexplored tools and technologies to see what fits best.

At CARDO AI I have the chance to do just that, all while working closely with team leaders and other experienced colleagues that inspire me and share their knowledge about common software engineering problems every day.

 Valon Januzaj, Senior Software Engineer

4. Agile methods and processes

At Cardo AI, we are committed to applying proper agile and scrum principles. 

With a wholesome approach to applying the Scrum framework, and clear roles and responsibilities, we make sure to give every one of our co-creators a reputable voice in their user stories. We don’t skip inclusive planning and are very thorough in our Retrospectives, in order to improve the overall experience sprint after sprint.

You can read more about it in our article dedicated to Agile working in Cardo AI.

Work in Cardo AI – Our Culture

At Cardo AI, we truly want people to thrive and become their best selves. We have a Talent management & leadership team that is committed to creating the perfect environment to do just that. 

What I love the most is the culture that we managed to create. We have carefully selected every person that has joined the company in order to have an environment that is welcoming, that is a fun place to work in. You are actually excited and happy to go to work every day.

Klajdi – Team Lead

1. Work-Life Balance

Solving big problems can keep you up for long hours, but this is not the way to go. We have assigned a WORK-LIFE balance officer (WLBO) that is responsible for our engineers in finding solutions and avoiding any situation of potential stress and burnout. 

“We are focusing on designing and applying common-sense Work-Life balance rules of thumb so everyone ensures they safeguard the space they deserve to receive the adequate replenishment required for their creative effort. Failure to achieve such is also an offense for our application of the Agile philosophy: If we don’t respect timeboxes, why do we even bother iterating that way?”

Rubin – Product Delivery & Growth Lead & Work-Life Balance Officer

2. A culture of learning and development

Continuous growth and development are a big part of our culture, and that is why self-improvement is one of our core company values. This means that you have the chance to drive your own growth, and CARDO AI gives you all the right tools to guide you and help you along the way.

We support and guide you in building your career path and understanding what is best for your future, giving you all the right tools (training, mentorship, skill mastering), insights, and direction, to develop your career. However, this does not mean that you have a pre-defined path to follow at all costs.

We don’t want to make a strict path for you to follow, but we give you the opportunity to grow, change (switching roles, or teams) and develop as you grow.

“I love being surrounded by very capable people, which is great because whenever I turn my head right or left, I have colleagues who are experts in their field.”

Rubin – Product Delivery & Growth Lead & Work-Life Balance Officer

Cardo Kickstart

Another amazing initiative, which is slowly becoming a tradition now, is Cardo Kickstart.

Cardo Kickstart is an initiative designed to help recent graduates transition into the job market in Tirana. This is a chance to build your network and work with senior professionals while making an impact in the fintech world.

To learn more about it, check our dedicated article to Cardo Kickstart, our training program for recent graduates.

3. Team outings and events

At CARDO AI, we understand the value of communication and collaboration. 

We organize frequent team-building activities and company trips to connect with and get to know our teammates in a different setting, building trust and engagement.

We bond outside of work over games, happy hours, concerts, chess, PlayStation, karaoke, the game of mime, volleyball, yoga, and more. Every two weeks, at the end of every sprint, we gather to enjoy drinks and play games. We love to organize team retreats on the beach and in the mountains.

One of our favorite business events is the Quarterly Business Reviews. These are a great opportunity for us to meet everyone and celebrate together the achievements of the past three months while sharing insights and goals on what we plan to achieve next.

Other Events from Cardo AI

Giving back to the tech community is a big goal for us. During the last year, we organized several events with a focus on tech and developers:

• Our first tech conference in June 2022 in Tirana, which gathered python and .NET enthusiasts and welcomed international experts and speakers
• A Data Engineering Workshop held at Epoka University, where our Senior Data Engineer, Luca Soato, shared valuable insights and practical knowledge related to data engineering technologies and applications like Google Co-Lab, Pyspark, Pandas, and JSON.
• The Women in Tech Webinars, with the objective of highlighting and telling the stories of women working inside the tech community.

4. Flexible and remote working

We know very well that our most productive times don’t necessarily fit into the 9 to 5 schedule, and that the office is not always the best environment for every employee.

Our goal is to facilitate and encourage each individual to play to their strengths, in order to feel at their best and achieve a healthy work-life balance. That is why at Cardo we give team members maximum flexibility to choose the setup and schedule that works best for them, whether that’s at home, at one of our offices, or at another location.

We are a results-oriented business – face-time is not required, although you might just want to spend your entire day with our great team. 

5. Entrepreneur-friendly environment

At Cardo, we have several initiatives to promote entrepreneurship within the company. Here are some of them: 

“Intrapreneurship in Cardo AI” – new ideas to launch new products, features, or new technologies proposed by team members, and a side development team is created to come to MVP and production stage.

“Cardo AI Startup Incubator” – we select 2/3 ideas per cohort and everyone that wants to follow any of the startups is free to do so. At the end of the program, both Cardo AI and everyone from our team can invest in the startups, so we all become entrepreneurs.

Now that you know what it is like to work at Cardo, you just need to apply to one of our open positions! Check them out, and if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to reach out to us on Linkedin, Instagram, or Twitter!