Anton Pleshivtsev spent over eight years at Bravado, climbing from Head of Engineering to VP, before stepping into a new chapter as Director of Engineering at Sendblue in the San Francisco Bay Area. He talks about the pivot from hands-on engineer to engineering leadership, what it's like to join a small, fast-moving startup after a long tenure at one company, and how he scaled, coached, and developed engineering teams as Bravado grew.

His technical roots are in Python, Django, Redis, and high-load systems, and the conversation traces what changes when an individual contributor becomes a leader, and what keeps external vendor relationships from breaking down.

What we covered:

• The pivot from hands-on engineer (Python, Django, Redis, high-load systems) to engineering leadership, and the shift in mindset that move requires.
• What it's like to join a small, fast-moving startup after a long tenure at one company, and the value of in-person team interactions.
• How he scaled, coached, and developed engineering teams as Bravado grew, building trust and relationships along the way.
• Navigating the challenges of management, and how he thinks about the engineering versus management career tracks.
• How he thinks about external vendors and contractors, what makes those relationships break down, and what makes them stick.
• The role of AI in engineering and management, interviewing for new engineering roles, the evolving role of product managers, and creating context for engineering tasks.

Episode 159 of the PreVetted Podcast.

Jonathan Hernandez is an Information Security and Risk professional at Nationwide Children's Hospital and a CISSP-certified cybersecurity expert with experience across governance, risk, compliance, and ethical hacking. He is also a public speaker and a Master of Divinity student at Southern Seminary, and in this episode he shares the story behind the credentials, starting with the day he arrived from the Philippines at nineteen, looking for Disneyland and touching snow for the first time, and the loneliness and identity loss that followed.

Jonathan talks about why he walked away from a booming tech career in Columbus to study theology full time while working full time, and how he came to believe that career change is not about money but about purpose. He explains how his faith became a real anchor during rejection, visa delays, and starting over from scratch, and why he refuses to let a title or a paycheck define his worth.

We get into the place where his two worlds meet: ethics in cybersecurity. Jonathan shares how an ethical hacking professor's warning shaped him, why he grounds his ethics beyond just not getting caught, and how he uses his skills to protect churches, nonprofits, and everyday people who cannot afford enterprise grade security.

Chapters:
00:00 Introduction to Jonathan Hernandez
02:01 Journey from the Philippines to the U.S.
04:58 Navigating Loneliness and Identity
10:00 The Intersection of Faith and Career
14:58 Redefining Success and Purpose
20:04 Living Out Faith in Technology
24:59 Protecting Human Dignity in an AI World
40:00 Final Thoughts and Reflections

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Episode 158 of the PreVetted Podcast.

Adrian Ferrero is the Co-Founder and CEO of Biome Makers, where for eleven years he has used DNA sequencing to read the communities of microbes living in soil and turn them into a functional picture of soil health. An economist by training who calls himself an innovator, Adrian sold an earlier DNA diagnostics company with his childhood friend Alberto Acedo, then reinvested everything to bring the personalized medicine concept into agriculture.

In this episode, Adrian explains how Biome Makers profiles the bacteria and fungi in soil samples, why organic and conventional apples carry very different microbial loads, and how thinking about soil at a functional level rather than a taxonomic one let the company compare farms across 56 countries. He breaks down nutrient use efficiency, why nitrous oxide is hundreds of times more potent than carbon dioxide, and how better soil data helps farmers use less fertilizer while polluting less.

The conversation also goes deep on the human side of building a company. Adrian shares why growing the team from two people to 55 was his hardest challenge, how he leads a remote and multicultural company across the US, Europe, Asia, and Latin America, and why he tries to keep business fun even in serious negotiations. He closes with a reminder not to underestimate our impact on the soil, and advice to build your own expectations and be brave enough to try.

Chapters:
00:00 Introduction to Biome Makers and Adrian Ferrero
03:21 The Role of Microbes in Agriculture
11:11 Understanding Soil Health and Nutrient Efficiency
16:22 Clients and Services of Biome Makers
21:05 Establishing Standards in Soil Health Technology
25:29 Functional Diversity of Soil Microbes
28:35 Understanding Soil Microbial Communities
30:44 Challenges of Team Building in Startups
35:47 Cultural Dynamics in Global Business
46:10 The Importance of Soil and Entrepreneurship

LinkedIn · Website

Episode 157 of the PreVetted Podcast.