Kartavya, a young engineer from IIT Kanpur (hence my junior :) ), recently visited us on behalf of his employer and our client - Automint . Their CTO Manish Kumar had officially proposed and sponsored Kartavya’s visit to our HQ - for upskilling, before joining them at their HQ in Panjim, Goa.

I will share Kartavya's journey, in his own words, in two parts. Part 1 is this blog giving an overview of his stay, with a spray of personal, professional and technical learnings and experiences. And part 2 will be the followup entry with more details into technical stuff that he practiced and explored under my guidance.

A small announcement before we proceed

If you are an AI pro, upcoming developer or a founder, and are interested to visit us for a semi-sponsored residency, then check out our blog and application for sponsored residency and this post by me on LinkedIn. You can come to visit us till September mid 2025. From Mid September to November you can join one of our planned (three week long) bootcamps for unleashing an upgraded version of yourself - personally and professionally. The residency and school will help you expand your perspective and make progress in areas related to career, skills, AI, tech, startups, GTM, fundraising and - unlocking secrets and recipes for a happy and prosperous you, with rest of the world. You are welcome to join us in the journey of fun and growth.

Now on to Kartavya’s story.

From the Hills of Himachal to the Heart of Engineering: My Journey at Godspeed

When I arrived in Saalig, a quiet village near Dharamshala, I had no idea this trip would reshape how I think about engineering.

Fresh off my onboarding at Automint, I was sent to spend a month at a small startup named Godspeed Systems. I had experience in AI, data, and backend but this was different. This wasn’t just another task or assignment.

This was a journey. And it began in the mountains.

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Code Meets Calm

Godspeed’s office is unlike anything you’d expect from a tech startup. A small, peaceful space, but buzzing with energy, passion, and ideas. There’s something about working in the hills that slows down time just enough for you to think deeply, write better, and build with intent.

My daily routine became a blend of: - Mornings with fresh mountain air and crisp commits - Afternoons of structured workflows, clear documentation, and hands-on building - Evenings filled with calm reflections or sometimes intense debugging followed by chai breaks

I wasn’t just working, I was absorbing a way of building that was thoughtful, lean, and future-ready.

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Building the Right Way

Godspeed teaches you to slow down and build right.

There’s a strong emphasis on:

• Documentation-first workflows

• Single-source-of-truth architecture

• Guardrails in development and CI

• Automation where it matters

Everything from request validation to frontend routes is driven by central schemas. No duplication. No guesswork. Just clean, predictable systems.

Every piece of logic, every flow I built or tested, had a reason behind it. There was no room for chaos here only calm, confident engineering.

Even though the team is small, they move like a well-oiled machine. From regular catch-ups to spontaneous blackboard debates, I was fortunate to be in the room where ideas were being shaped in real-time. And in a setup like this, you don’t just observe, you absorb.

It was also here that I truly understood the value of process and system design not just as documentation exercises but as foundational tools for building resilient systems. Every flow, feature, or pipeline was backed by a clear "why", a thoughtful "how", and a measurable "what".

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Saarthi, Godspeed Framework and the Philosophy Behind It

During my time here, I also got hands-on with tools that reflect Godspeed’s philosophy of minimalism, structure, and automation.

The Godspeed Framework, with its schema-first architecture, promotes modular, declarative development where a single source of truth powers your entire stack from API definitions and validations to frontend UI scaffolding and documentation. It’s fast, guardrailed, and incredibly clean to work with especially when you're building full-stack apps with precision and speed.

Then there’s Saarthi an AI-powered autonomous coding agent that lives right inside your editor. It’s not just a code assistant. Saarthi is a complete development partner. It can:

• Generate full-stack code aligned with frameworks like Godspeed

• Review code across six dimensions

• Automate DevOps flows (Docker, Render, CI/CD)

• Manage QA with intelligent test case generation and mocking

• Even help with product strategy, documentation, and debugging

You can spin up specialized agents inside Saarthi be it a DevOps engineer, a QA lead, a coding coach, or even a product strategist. It adapts to your context and evolves with your tasks.

These tools weren’t just productivity hacks they reflected a mindset: build with clarity, automate the repeatable, and empower developers (and even LLMs) to operate at their best.

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Weekends in the Wild

Of course, life here wasn’t all work.

On weekends, we’d head to nearby spots like McLeod Ganj, Dharamkot, and quiet hillside cafes. We chilled, explored, and met people from all walks of life.

What stood out most? The artists. Singers, instrumentalists, musicians many of whom performed live in little mountain cafés under fairy lights. It was surreal.

Some evenings we watched sunsets from rooftops while someone strummed a guitar. Other times, we’d get lost in music over hot momos and warm conversations.

For someone who lives and breathes logic, this kind of creative immersion felt... grounding.

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What I’m Taking Back

This month was more than a learning journey. It was a shift in mindset.

Here’s what I carry back with me:

• Start with why. Don’t jump into implementation, understand the goal.

• Write for clarity. Logs, documentation, and code should be structured so both humans and intelligent agents like LLMs can understand, reason over, and act on them effectively.

• Design for scale. Even small teams can build big if their systems are clean.

• Balance structure with spontaneity. The best engineers know how to do both.

• And perhaps most importantly engineering is a craft, not a checklist.

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The Road Ahead

Back at Automint, I’ll be putting these ideas into action. Whether it’s improving internal workflows, contributing to AI-powered tools, or shaping customer experiences I now have a stronger foundation.

The hills taught me more than I expected. And the team at Godspeed showed me how a small, focused group can quietly build something that scales far beyond its size.

This journey gave me something that no tutorial or bootcamp could: A philosophy of building.

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Final Thoughts

Some journeys start with a flight. Some begin with a job offer. And some like this one start with a hill station, a warm team, and a quiet desk by the window.

Thank you, Godspeed, for showing me what focused, intentional engineering looks like. And thank you, Saalig, for the peace and perspective.

This was more than a learning journey. It was a reset. And I’ll carry it with me, wherever I build next.