Betsy Haibel
I build software that is kind to its engineers, and engineers who are kind to each other.
Skills
- Safe-but-speedy evolution of brownfield software and systems
- Building technical alignment within and across engineering teams
- Unlocking the potential of early-career and mid-level engineers
Languages / Frameworks
Ruby/Rails; Javascript (Node; Vue; React/React Native); progressive front-end web development; Rust; Elixir; Java
Professional Experience
CTO
- Supported engineering coaching clients from a wide range of skill levels and backgrounds in levelling up themselves and their systems
- Provided pragmatic, growth-stage-appropriate architecture and best-practices consulting to startup clients
- Provided hands-on coaching & development on projects ranging from pre-seed startup prototypes to legacy rescues
- Developed and presented workshops and other educational materials on both engineering culture & strictly technical topics
Principal Software Architect
- Backfilled departing CTO as interim Head of Engineering for 30-person team
- Engineering client management for JP Morgan Chase's first externally-hosted SaaS implementation
- "Communications glue" between distributed and on-site engineering teams, including multi-timezone teams
- Coached early- and mid-career developers & tech leads. Designed technical "stretch" projects that served both large-scale architecture needs and their implementers' individual growth goals.
- Developed software architectures and engineering processes that allowed a 30-person team to move with agility in a secure, highly regulated environment.
- Resolved technical and other conflicts between engineers and other stakeholders
Member of Technical Staff
- Built and maintained fundraising management software using technologies including Ruby, Rails, PostgreSQL, Redis, JQuery/PJAX, React, Node.
- Untangled and modernized years-untouched views that were core to various donation management workflows.
- Worked closely with new-to-the-web graphic designer to bring his aesthetic vision to life without sacrificing UX goals.
- Built rules-based permissioning to allow tiered customer service workflows, while maintaining security of shared data in a multi-tenant environment.
Senior Applications Developer
- Built and maintained custom business software using technologies including Ruby, Rails, MySQL, MongoDB, Redis, JavaScript, CoffeeScript, AngularJS, Kafka, Elasticsearch.
- Extracted banner management module from flagship e-commerce app; expanded it into a full-fledged custom content management system capable of serving complicated holiday promotional needs
- served as lead developer and project manager on a year-end order accounting audit process. Duties included identifying of inconsistent accounting data, identifying and implementing corrections to said inconsistencies, and resolving the root causes of data inconsistencies
Senior Software Engineer
- Maintained and did day-to-day feature development for Rails-based ed-tech application, sometimes to tight deadlines.
- Evangelized for, and got, a gradual migration of the app test suite from a non-DRY hodgepodge of custom helpers to something which followed RSpec convention.
- Led extensive refactoring/unification of curricular metadata archictecture.
- Extended search functionality using Elasticsearch.
Senior Ruby Developer
- Maintained and did day-to-day feature development for Rails-based blood glucose tracking application, with a strong focus on testing and security.
- Integrated Rails frontend with the Java-based API used by a related iOS app.
- Wrote reasonably complete Cucumber test suite from near-scratch; in the process, dealt with the pitfalls inherent in complex test fixtures, cleaning of multiple databases, mocking of an extensive HTTPS API, and XPath table traversal.
- Led Rails 3 upgrade.
- Go-to developer for Ruby-specific questions.
Senior Web Developer
- Overhauled flagship Rails application, the DIY Project Planner - was heavily involved in a complete UI redesign, and solely responsible for the ensuing near-ground-up rewrite and necessary data migrations.
- Maintained four Rails applications, including systems administration duties.
- Integrated with external systems with varying levels of API coverage.
- Did some UI design work; shepherded others' work from "concept" to "specification."
- Mentored junior front-end developer/Drupal developer
- Rebuilt server environment and reconstructed corrupted MySQL data following a severe hacking incident.
Junior Engineer/Event Producer
- Completely overhauled look and feel of Interchange-based e-commerce module, including hard-coded admin interface elements.(Original templates were written in an unholy mix of Perl, HTML, and a Perl-based custom tag language.)
- Designed web pages and related graphics, adhering strictly to client style guides.
- Wrote documentation and other technical support materials.
- Assisted lead developer in maintenance and testing of large Perl application.
Education:
- University of Maryland University College, computer and information science major (28 credits completed)
- Montgomery College, technical theater major (54 credits completed)
- Montgomery Blair High School Math/Science/Computer Science Magnet program, grad. 2004