"I thank the whole Softjourn team for their professionalism and exceptional work under often adverse conditions. We would not have delivered this project and been successful without all of you. I would be glad to work with any of you again."
Strengthening a Bank’s Engineering Processes and Scalable Cloud Infrastructure
How Softjourn supported a financial institution with scalable infrastructure and development process improvements.
ABOUT THE CLIENT:
Project:Engineering Process Maturity
Industry:Finance
Client since:2022
Headquarters:Texas, USA
Technologies:
Linux,
Mulesoft,
Salesforce
Challenge
The client faced fragmented workflows, limited process maturity, and lacked scalable infrastructure across its multi-vendor environment during a major transformation initiative.
Solution
Softjourn introduced structured development practices and built secure, cloud-based infrastructure using AWS and Azure—empowering cohesive engineering across teams.
Benefits
- Structured SDLC and QA practices
- Scalable AWS & Azure environments
- Improved team collaboration
- Reliable infrastructure for future growth
Introduction
As a forward-thinking bank expanded its digital capabilities, it sought to strengthen its development workflows and cloud infrastructure to better support ongoing innovation and operational efficiency.
Softjourn was brought in based on a trusted recommendation from the bank’s CTO, who had previously led a successful engagement with our team in a similarly complex environment. That history of collaboration laid the foundation for a productive and solutions-focused partnership.
Softjourn partnered with the bank to enhance existing practices, introducing structured processes, scalable infrastructure, and collaborative tooling tailored to a complex, multi-vendor environment.
This work was one of several parallel initiatives under a new modular banking platform. We helped unify fragmented vendor systems and stabilize a system that had previously lacked clear architectural oversight.
- Client's Head of System Operations
The Challenge
While undertaking a complex system migration and preparing for audits, the bank also faced the challenge of unifying fragmented workflows, aligning engineering efforts across multiple systems, and establishing long-term practices for deployment, monitoring, and operations.
Given the diversity of vendors and tools involved, building cohesive workflows and scalable infrastructure required a partner with both technical depth and the ability to introduce a structured engineering culture in a highly regulated environment.
The Solution
Softjourn played a key role in formalizing and implementing the bank’s software development and infrastructure processes. We introduced and institutionalized best practices such as:
- A full software development lifecycle (SDLC) with peer reviews, solution design workflows, and architecture decision records
- Disaster recovery plans, incident response protocols, and branching strategies
- Creation of a system context diagram that became a core artifact across teams – clarifying roles, responsibilities, and system dependencies
- Implementation of structured QA practices, including both manual and automated testing
On the infrastructure side, Softjourn designed and deployed a hybrid multi-cloud architecture using AWS and Azure.
Key highlights included:
- Building the AWS infrastructure from scratch with secure, isolated environments and centralized logging
- Automating CI/CD pipelines using Azure DevOps
- Provisioning infrastructure using Terraform and Ansible, with change tracking via Spacelift
- Implementing secure secret management practices
- Integrating a real-time observability platform to support system monitoring and alerting
We also deployed and maintained critical third-party systems, including a Kubernetes-based cash desk application used by internal bank staff.
To support these improvements, Softjourn deployed a cross-functional team including architects, DevOps engineers, QA specialists, security engineers, and project managers, ensuring all aspects of system operations were covered end-to-end.
Softjourn delivered a robust cloud infrastructure and helped unify engineering efforts across multiple systems, ensuring scalability, security, and efficient collaboration in a highly regulated environment.
The Benefits
By establishing robust engineering and cloud infrastructure practices, Softjourn helped the bank move from reactive operations to a sustainable, proactive model.
The practices and tools we introduced have become part of their long-term framework for building and scaling secure financial systems.
Key Benefits:
- Introduced structured, repeatable software development processes
- Created shared system documentation and workflows across teams
- Built secure, scalable AWS infrastructure with multi-environment isolation
- Automated infrastructure provisioning and deployments
- Enabled visibility and monitoring through centralized observability tooling
- Delivered third-party systems with minimal downtime and clear ownership handoff
- Provided full-stack support from project management to DevOps, architecture, and security
Conclusion
The processes and frameworks we introduced remain part of our client’s internal best practices — a testament to our long-term impact.
The client praised Softjourn's team for being proactive and self-organized, as well as deeply experienced in banking software development.
Interested in seeing how Softjourn can help enhance your next project? Contact us today to learn more.
Partnership & Recognition
