Wrike’s Aleksei Kartavenko: The AI tools engineers need to succeed

There’s a trade-off that comes with seniority in engineering that nobody really advertises: the more you lead, the less you build. For Wrike Engineering Director Aleksei Kartavenko, his leadership role meant less hands-on work — until AI changed that. With over 25 years in the industry and almost a decade at Wrike, Aleksei leads two product units, and his passion remains solving customer problems and building great products, no matter his title. “For a time, the heavy managerial demands of a director’s life meant I lost the opportunity to contribute personally to this work.