PRINCIPAL PLATFORM INTEGRATION ENGINEER · MAYO CLINIC PLATFORM

Production GenAI,
built for the
hardest place to
ship it: healthcare.

I'm Segun. I direct the GenAI engineering team at Mayo Clinic Platform, where we scope, build, and ship production AI in one of the most regulated environments there is. I turn frontier models into reusable, governed tooling on Databricks Mosaic AI and Vertex AI, so other teams move fast without breaking compliance. Fifteen years in healthcare technology taught me the demo is the easy part. Getting AI into real hands, and keeping it safe, is the job.

01 · WRITING

Notes on the work

APR 15, 2026Building enterprise GenAI tooling that clinicians actually useplatform8 MIN READ→MAR 02, 2026Why I self-host the boring stuff on Hetznerinfra6 MIN READ→JAN 20, 2026HIPAA as a design constraint, not an afterthoughtgovernance5 MIN READ→
Selected essays · 3 of manyView all writing →
02 · ABOUT

Operating principles

My job is delivery. I scope, build, and ship production AI in environments where a wrong answer has real consequences, then turn what worked into reusable tooling other teams can run without me in the room.

As Principal Platform Integration Engineer & GenAI Engineering Team Lead at Mayo Clinic Platform, I run a team of senior engineers, researchers, and analysts. We own the generative AI stack end to end, from LLM and agent orchestration on Databricks Mosaic AI and Vertex AI down to the SDKs, guardrails, and IDE tooling our developers build on. I also sit across the table from executives and translate where AI pays off into roadmaps they can fund.

Before that I was Associate Cloud Architect in Mayo's Enterprise Cloud Center of Excellence, where I set the GCP reference patterns and stood up the Vertex AI platforms behind Mayo's move to cloud-native ML. On the side, I co-founded Novashock, a studio shipping AI-native SaaS, which is where I learned to carry a product from problem framing all the way to go-to-market.

A few things I believe. Simple systems beat clever ones over time. Governance is a design constraint, not paperwork you bolt on at the end. And a roadmap only works if the engineer building it and the executive funding it can both see the point of it.

Now
  • BuildingA reusable Agent SDK on Databricks Mosaic AI, plus the Python packages, CLIs, and IDE tooling that standardize delivery.
  • Leading2 Senior Platform Engineers + cross-functional researchers and analysts.
  • LearningLeadership Greater Rochester, 2025–2026 cohort. Graduating May 2026.
  • ServingBoard of Directors, Rochester Art Center.
03 · TRAJECTORY

Fifteen years, in healthcare

OCT 2023 – NOW
Principal Platform Integration Engineer · GenAI Team Lead at Mayo Clinic Platform
Direct and grow the GenAI engineering team behind Mayo Clinic Platform's enterprise AI strategy, leading senior platform engineers alongside researchers and principal data analysts. Built a reusable Agent SDK on the Databricks Mosaic AI Agent Framework so internal teams build, evaluate, and deploy agents without touching the underlying SDK, and drove Databricks adoption across Model Serving and the bring-your-own-model migration. Shipped a production guardrails service (TRUST-H) that enforces safety and patient-data privacy across every AI workload. Deployed 5+ open-source models and 4 proprietary systems (Gemini and OpenAI) now used by hundreds of clinicians and IT staff, and advise executives on where AI actually earns its keep.
Databricks Mosaic AIUnity CatalogVertex AILLM agentsRAGPython
JAN 2021 – OCT 2023
Associate Cloud Architect at Mayo Clinic
Led GCP cloud architecture governance inside the Enterprise Cloud Center of Excellence, setting the reference patterns and advising teams on enterprise-wide rollouts. Built the Vertex AI platforms for model training, deployment, and API serving that carried Mayo's shift to cloud-native ML. Proved out new offerings through PoCs (Azure Virtual Desktop, GCP Cloud Workstation, Vertex AI pipelines) and worked with Enterprise Architects on the Mayo Clinic Cloud AIF offering.
GCPVertex AIKubernetesTerraform
JUN 2017 – JAN 2021
Senior IT Programmer at Mayo Clinic
Led application security onboarding onto the SailPoint identity platform, owning delivery for hundreds of enterprise applications. Wrote the requirements, testing, and documentation frameworks that became standard practice for business-critical apps. Untangled hard LDAP, SSO, and clustered-environment problems across teams.
SailPointLDAPSSOC#
JUL 2012 – JUN 2017
IT Programmer at Mayo Clinic
Replaced paper-based clinical workflows with web applications and cut the manual effort by 90%, which earned Silver and Bronze Quality Fellow recognition. Mentored 5+ engineers and lifted team output 25% through hands-on coaching and training.
Quality Fellow ★WebMentorship
JUL 2014 – NOW
Co-Founder & Strategic Advisor at Novashock / Empowered Founders
Co-founded a studio shipping a portfolio of AI-native SaaS products. I carry products from problem framing through go-to-market, own the customer-facing narrative, and architect the cloud builds on AWS and GCP. Cut API response times 30% by moving to GraphQL.
AWSGCPGTMGraphQL
04 · BEYOND THE KEYBOARD

Leadership & governance

2024 – NOW
Board of Directors at Rochester Art Center
Board governance for a nonprofit arts organization serving Southeast Minnesota.
BoardGovernance
2025 – 2026
Leadership Greater Rochester at cohort fellow
Selective community leadership program for executives moving into board service and civic roles across Southeast Minnesota. Graduating May 2026.
Cohort '26
2022 – 2023
Minnesota Ace Tech Leadership Cohort at completed
Selective technology leadership program for emerging executives in Minnesota's tech sector.
Tech Leadership
2016 – 2019
Board of Directors at Family Service Rochester
Served on the board, contributing to strategic planning and community outreach for a family services nonprofit.
BoardNonprofit
2015 – 2018
Vice Chair at eMERGing Leaders, Mayo Clinic ERG
Vice-chaired the employee resource group for emerging leaders inside Mayo Clinic.
ERG
05 · CREDENTIALS

Certifications

Google Cloud
Professional Cloud Architect
PCA●
Google Cloud
Associate Cloud Engineer
ACE●
Google Cloud
Digital Leader
CDL●
CNCF
Certified Kubernetes Administrator
CKA●
Scaled Agile
SAFe 6 Agilist
SA●

Currently sitting for additional certifications, including Databricks.

Education
  • 2015M.A., IT & Software Engineering Leadership · College of St. Scholastica, Duluth, MN
  • 2009B.A., Social Science · Winona State University, Winona, MN
06 · CONNECT

Reach out

Let's
connect.

EmailHi@SegunKola.de↗Phone(507) 202-9001↗Websegunkola.de↗LinkedInin/segunkola↗