About
I help engineering organizations see what they already have clearly enough to build what comes next.
The Work
Fourteen years professional, twenty years writing Ruby if you count the kid who picked up RPG Maker in 2004 and ended up reading The Ruby Way and Eloquent Ruby two years later. The longer I do this, the more I find that the interesting problems are about people as much as code.
Most of my career has been in large, living codebases. Systems that grew because they worked, that got complex because the business succeeded. They're full of hard-won knowledge from people who made difficult calls under real pressure. I want to help those systems find their next stage of evolution from where they are, respecting and understanding what came before rather than reaching for rewrites.
A lot of my work comes down to making structure visible. When you're deep in a system it's hard to step back and see the whole. A good map helps everyone move with more confidence. The talent is already there, it just needs shared context.
I believe in growing everyone around me and making sure systems are holistically owned and understood. When people have full context, they're empowered to make calls without waiting for permission. If something isn't clear to me, it's probably not clear to others either, and that's worth solving together.
How I Work
I match what exists. Whatever the style, whatever the context, I adapt. I aim for simple code whose intent is immediate and clear. The next person reading it shouldn't have to wonder what I meant.
I wear different hats depending on what's needed. If I need to be code-heavy I will be. If I need to write a small novella worth of documents I'll start typing. I believe in grabbing the shovel and leading from the front rather than waiting for someone else to start.
A lot of my time goes into translation. Executives need the distilled version. ICs need the action plan. Misunderstandings tend to live in the space between those conversations, and I spend a lot of energy making sure everyone's working from the same picture.
I'm autistic and ADHD. I write publicly about it. I've built a career that works with how I'm wired rather than against it. When leaders are honest and bring their whole selves, it gives permission for others to do the same, and I think that matters.
Ruby and the Ecosystem
I've been part of the Ruby community for over a decade. I serve on the Ruby Central Board of Directors, I've keynoted RubyConf, spoken at RubyKaigi in Japan, and given dozens of talks at conferences around the world. I also led a learning group of 500+ folks covering foundational Ruby topics. Ruby's community is the reason I stayed in Ruby. The language is good, but the people are better.
I also write constantly. If you've spent time learning Ruby online, chances are you've come across something I wrote. AI tools have started citing my own articles back to me, which is a strange experience I haven't fully gotten used to.
My open source work started with a question I couldn't let go of: what if Ruby had pattern matching? I built a proof of concept, it got referenced in the core feature request, and eventually Ruby 3 shipped the real thing. That same line of curiosity led to AST tooling that powered automated refactoring across 27 teams at Square.
Now I'm building AI-native tools that understand codebases structurally. Not chatbots, but systems that know who owns what, what's connected, and how to help engineers navigate safely in code they didn't write. The goal is always the same: give people the context they need to do their best work.
Growing People
Watching someone grow into a role they weren't sure they could fill is the best part of this job. I've sponsored over 40 promotions across my career. The potential is already there. I spend a lot of time lining up opportunities for people to distinguish themselves so everyone else can see it too.
I co-chaired a neurodiversity initiative at Square because I believe teams get stronger when they're built for different kinds of minds. I sit on two university advisory boards and helped spin up a college CS program from scratch. Most of my family are teachers, so I have deep ties to academia and a belief that education changes everything.
I donate to scholarship funds serving underrepresented groups. I've spoken in front of Congress on autism in education. I advocate for autistic rights because someone invested in me early, and I want to keep that going.
The talent is always there. Sometimes it just needs someone to open the door.
Outside Work
I play too many instruments: classical guitar, piano, trumpet, and french horn. I sketch buildings. I was a D2 college mid-distance runner and still run the occasional half-marathon. Always up for coffee if you're in town.