CV · founder · product · leadership
Mirek Havránek
Founder · product manager & product owner · Brno, Czechia
I turn products and teams into a business: decisions on data, calm under pressure, fluent with developers and the C-suite alike. Behind me: product management in SaaS, product ownership of AI products in the energy sector, enterprise delivery under ITIL, and nine years of leading teams of 8 (paid) to 250 (volunteer). Trained in informatics and mathematics.
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Numbers I stand behind
- 250people in my Roverway 2024 programme department, including a 35-person international planning team, all under me
- 6,000participants from 38 countries whose programme I was responsible for
- €200,000+client invoicing I ran in 5 months (high tens of thousands of euro a month), Sensoneo
- 7production releases in 14 weeks as the sole PM, through a formal ITIL change process
- 4.75 / 5“kept his promises”, my team's anonymous rating when I left
- 5×data-backed price increase I pushed through a whole group of companies
- €100,000+six-figure programme budget at Roverway; the branch budget I audit today
- 100 %of my Roverway programme team would join a team led by me again (anonymous form, 21 responses, 2024)
Now: building a startup
Full-time founder since September 2026. With a technical partner (a senior backend developer) I'm launching several B2B products in parallel: validating the problem with customers, finding go-to-market, first traction and investors. Ideas go through a stage-gate process; only customer evidence moves them on.
Where I'm heading
Where product and strategy get decided: as a founder, or as CPO / Head of Product / in the leadership of a smaller tech company. People and money, product judgment, and enough technical and mathematical depth to understand what the team builds.
Experience
2025–26 was a deliberate run of contracts to see SaaS product, AI products and enterprise delivery from the inside before founding.
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Founder — product, customers, investors
Customer discovery, sales conversations, product decisions, onboarding and the investor story. A technical partner owns architecture, data and quality.
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Technical Project Manager — DRSI, the platform behind Ireland's deposit return scheme
Sole PM from June for the platform running Ireland's deposit return scheme (client: Re-turn). One person, eight hats: delivery and releases, business analysis, Scrum, team lead, client account, incidents, change management (ServiceNow, weekly CAB) and invoicing.
- Led a 6–8 person delivery team (backend, frontend, QA) inside a four-party setup; capacity-based sprints, clear priorities, a protected team.
- 7 production releases and 1 emergency hotfix in 14 weeks through a formal ITIL change process; a weekend incident fixed by Sunday morning, an RCA that closed a release-process gap.
- Ran client invoicing in the high tens of thousands of euro a month, a couple of hundred thousand euro in total.
- Automated the routine with 8 AI skills (change requests, release notes, Jira stories, capacity plans, stand-up prep), each with a manual fallback.
- Handover without knowledge loss: a 12-part pack built as “I do – we do – you do”; my successor passed my level within two weeks.
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Product Owner — Energy Portfolio Simulator
Product owner of the Energy Portfolio Simulator: a simulation and optimisation engine that models complex energy microgrids (photovoltaics, battery storage, EV charging) from real data and market scenarios, built with an in-house team of data scientists and AI engineers on optimisation solvers and neural networks. I turned its output into financial indicators and investment strategies for C-level management.
- A new domain in two months. Energy is said to take years; I got oriented in it through systematic study with AI and checks with practitioners, and made independent product decisions in it.
- Market analyses and a product-market-fit plan; an independent paid analysis by outside consultants later reached the same conclusions.
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Product Manager — Mergado Marketplaces
Strategy and development of a SaaS tool that integrates e-shops with marketplaces (Allegro, Kaufland) through APIs: product decisions, backlog, roadmap, frontend and backend coordination.
- Planned and ran the end-to-end order-management project for WooCommerce and Shopify, from data analysis and UI/UX design through agile development to release.
- Decisions grounded in data and the market: 10+ in-depth customer interviews, regular testing, surveys, webinars.
- Took the product from an undervalued beta to a full solution and got a more-than-5× price increase and key partnerships through the stakeholders of the whole Profitak group.
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Head of Programme & steering committee member — Roverway 2024
A European gathering of rovers and rangers (WOSM & WAGGGS). Responsible for the entire programme for ~6,000 participants from 38 countries.
- Led my own 250-person programme department, including a 35-person international planning team; built the programme team from zero seven months before the event (110 people contacted).
- Six-figure euro budget; oversight of the event's mobile app.
- Negotiations with national contingents; three weeks of on-site crisis management.
- Team feedback after the event (anonymous form, 21 responses): 8.9 / 10 overall, 100 % would join a team led by me again.
- Interviewed about leading the programme by the Czech scouting magazine Kmen: “S velkou zahraniční akcí jsem neměl žádnou zkušenost” (in Czech).
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Junák – Czech Scouting: three roles
- Chair of a branch's audit committee ( – ): oversight of a branch with a ≈ €100,000 budget, 60+ volunteers and 180+ children.
- HR projects coordinator at the national headquarters ( – ): HR methodology for leaders, lecturing at training seminars, member of the Strategy 2030 team; built, and still maintain, the Google Apps Script system that matches coaching requests with coaches for the “Koučink pro skauty” programme (dozens of users).
- Troop leader and rover-crew founder (2017 – 2022): built a unit from zero; three summer camps for 60 participants with ≈ €10,000 budgets.
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Computer science and mathematics teacher
Python, databases and ERD, network theory, MS Office; a “students teach seniors” project. Where I learned to explain complex things simply.
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Freelance filmmaker and video project coordinator
Weddings, commercials, real-estate presentations and interviews, in later years only occasionally; 3D visualisations (Twinmotion), AR filters (Spark AR), Adobe Premiere Pro and After Effects.
Education & credentials
Education
- Bc., Masaryk University (2020 – 2023): Informatics with a focus on education and Mathematics in education
- Enterprise Informatics, Faculty of Economics, Masaryk University (2020 – 2022)
- Gymnázium tř. Kapitána Jaroše, Brno (2011 – 2020), mathematics class
Courses & certificates
- McKinsey.org Forward, McKinsey & Company, 2025
- McKinsey Forward Volunteer Ambassador, 2026, McKinsey.org — one of 60 ambassadors chosen from 3,000+ applicants; I help Czech tech and product people decide whether the programme is for them
- Presentation skills, KPMG workshop, 2025
- PL-300 Power BI Data Analyst, Microsoft, in progress
- Agile & Scrum for Product Owners, certification course, 2025
- Certified medic (2020) and CLS medic (Army)
- Leadership course Rovel, Czech Scouting, 2020
Awards & beyond work
- Medal for Service Abroad, 3rd Class, Minister of Defence, 2024; medals of the Multinational Battle Group Slovakia, 2024
- Czech Army active reserve since 2022; deployed abroad in 2024
- Silver Medal of Prof. Jan Janský, Czech Red Cross, 2025 (blood donation)
- Member of Mensa Czech Republic since 2011
- Volleyball, motorcycles, the gym, board games · driving licence A, B
Languages
- Czech: native
- Slovak: fluent (working language at Sensoneo)
- English: C1 (international team, Irish client)
- German: B1
Skills, with proof
Every skill has a place where I've shown it. Hover a tag to see where; click it to jump there.
Leadership & management
- Leading teams of 8–250 peopleRoverway, Sensoneo, Scouts
- Finance & invoicingSensoneo, Roverway, Scouts
- Release & change management (ITIL)Sensoneo, Mergado
- Incident & crisis managementSensoneo, Roverway
- Hiring, onboarding & handoverRoverway, Sensoneo, Scouts
- Stakeholders & negotiationRoverway, Mergado, Sensoneo, Mycroft Mind
- Calm under pressureRoverway, Sensoneo, Army reserve
- Presenting, lecturing, mentoringScouts, Gymnázium, Mergado, Sensoneo, Mycroft Mind
Product & business
- Product strategy & product-market fitMycroft Mind, Mergado, startup
- Customer & market researchMergado, Mycroft Mind, startup
- Pricing & partnershipsMergado
- Business analysis & specificationSensoneo, Mergado, Mycroft Mind
- Agile / ScrumMergado, Sensoneo, Mycroft Mind
- Strategic planningScouts, Roverway, Mycroft Mind, Mergado, startup
- Learning a new domain fastMycroft Mind, Sensoneo, Roverway
Tech & data
- AI automation & agentic workflowsSensoneo, startup, this site, Mycroft Mind
- Advanced spreadsheets & Apps ScriptScouts, Mergado, Sensoneo, Roverway
- Power BI, SQL, analyticsMycroft Mind, Mergado
- Mathematics, statistics & ML fundamentalsMasaryk University, Mycroft Mind
- Programming: Python, C#/.NET, JSMasaryk University, this site
- REST APIs & integrationsMergado, Sensoneo
- System design: UML, ERD, DFDMasaryk University, Sensoneo, Mergado
- Vibe coding & CI/CD for proofs of conceptthis site, startup
Where I stand with AI
AI automation is my main lever, and I use it every day. Vibe coding is a product-owner skill I keep sharp to pilot-test business ideas fast, not an identity.
- I know what AI can and cannot do, from the inside. At Mycroft Mind I saw neural networks built and trained, and I have the mathematics to judge which use cases suit AI and which don't.
- Automation first. At Sensoneo I encoded the house rules into eight AI skills (change requests, release notes, Jira stories, capacity plans, mail digests), each with a human in the loop and a manual fallback. My startup's idea-discovery pipeline runs on AI agents.
- Proof of concept, not production. I build POCs with AI agents to test an idea at a fraction of the usual cost, and I know a vibe-coded codebase is usually rewritten once the idea proves itself. That trade is the point.
References
How I lead
- Short meetings, fast answers, clear priorities.
- I delegate real responsibility and don't micromanage; when something is stuck between departments, I take it upstairs myself.
- I shield the team from outside chaos; bad news goes out early, with a proposed fix.
- Calm under pressure: three weeks of crisis room in Norway, a weekend production incident in Ireland.
What my team said when I left Sensoneo (September 2026)
“I've worked with six project managers on the Irish project and you were the best of them, both as a person and professionally. Thanks again for holding the whole team together.”
“Working with you is great… we're going to miss you.”
“Thanks Mirek, that's a good summary, great to see the plan evolving.”
“calm · non-confrontational · purposeful · direct · human · confident · action-oriented”
Anonymous survey of the whole core team on my departure (5 responses, scale 1–5): kept his promises 4.75, protected the team 4.75, calm under pressure 5.0.
What my programme team said after Roverway 2024
Anonymous form after the event (August 2024, 21 responses: section leads, activity coordinators, core team and team members; scale 1–10). Overall rating as Head of Programme 8.9 / 10; 100 % would join a team led by me again (18 “yes, definitely”, 3 “probably yes”). Highest marks: using my position to unblock problems quickly (9.6), delegating and trusting people with real responsibility (9.4), knowing the programme in depth (9.3), support when someone got stuck (9.1). The three words they chose most: visionary, decisive, ambitious.
“From no team in January to 30+ people and a programme for 5,000. I still don't fully understand how we made it. Proud of us.”
“… our job was urgent and they put it at the bottom of their backlog, we asked like 5 times and in the end they told us to do it ourselves. … you calmed me down, talked to their head before the meeting, prepped us what we need, what we can give up and who says what, and then in the meeting you just handled it calmly. job got done and somehow we are still on good terms with them. … thanks, that was real leadership”
“I've been on four international events and this was the best-led programme team I've seen.”
“Preparing us for difficult meetings. You always told me beforehand: this is what they will say, this is what we want, let me open it. It made me much more confident.”
What they asked me to do differently: be more available in the planning phase (7.0 for “had enough time for you”), turn the vision into the next concrete step (7.4), and carry less myself. Fair, and on my list. The Czech scouting magazine Kmen later interviewed me about leading the programme (in Czech).
Reference persons
- Josef Nykl, Head of Delivery and member of the product board, Mycroft Mind · LinkedIn
- Michal Markovič, HR and recruitment, Sensoneo · LinkedIn
- Marko Krivánek, Technical Project Manager, Sensoneo (my successor, whom I onboarded) · LinkedIn
Further references (Roverway 2024, Mergado, Czech Scouting, the client side at Sensoneo) on request: write to mirek.havranek24@gmail.com.
Contact
- mirek.havranek24@gmail.com
- linkedin.com/in/mirek-havranek
- Location
- Brno, Czechia · remote or hybrid across CZ and SK
- Phone
- on request by e-mail
- CV
- PDF · Markdown · havranci.cz/portfolio
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