Lee Hilton

Principal Software Engineer, PassiveInvesting.com

An opportunity to work with a previous subordinate, PassiveInvesting.com had determined to start a software arm to develop internal products. The initial product was with 24 Hour Pickleball, a membership driven sports gym. We developed native applications for iOS and Android, as well as web based business management tooling for facility operators.

• Key decision maker in primary technologies. Based on these decisions, we built with Laravel on the backend and VueJS + Ionic on the native app side.
• Sole developer of initial native application versions.
• Provided training needed to bring other contributors into native application development work.
• Responsible for managing relationship to Apple and Google distribution platforms.
• Engineered and maintained continuous release tooling and processes.

Head of Engineering, ComplYant App Inc.

Reporting solely to the CEO, I was responsible for executing the vision of our Founder and contributing stakeholders. While I was responsible for the initial product MVP, we quickly raised funds and grew the company. My team grew to 34 Engineers, 8 Leads, 3 UX Designers and 4 Product Managers. Keynote projects include IRS filings and automated banking services.

• Crafted the initial MVP product used to test with customers and seek fundraising.
• Successfully helped founder raise multiple rounds as the technology and product expert within the company.
• Grew relationship with our investors and provided regular updates and answers to questions.
• Mentored and grew the team needed to achieve our mission. This included onboarding over 40 individuals, providing consistent onboarding experiences and providing resources needed for their success.
• Grew internal expertise in nation wide business related tax codes, including a customized CMS for storing and researching this knowledge.

Developer, Riverbed Technology

Starting in October of 2019, I was brought in as a full time contractor with the Riverbed Technology Education and Training platform team. We have a wild stack of technology, but it is all based around Laravel and Vue.js but includes ansible automation, VMWare's enterprise products and more. Riverbed has used all of my accumulated skills and been a wonderful opportunity for growth.

• Initially focused on refactoring a very large and old codebase on a team that has been understaffed for years.
• Created custom Java plugins for the Apache Guacomole proxy service. This includes an SSO solution, rebranding and analytics tracking features.
• Ported the infrastructure machine templates from Ubuntu to CentOS, using ansible to automate the build and customization of our various services.
• Production work on new and changing features for both the internal admin tools and public facing websites for training and education portals.
• Participated on shift coverage to provide operations support during off hours and holidays. Our customers are in every timezone, so our support is 24/7.

Owner / Lead Dev, Hipster Consulting, LLC

After a dozen years in the industry, I struck out on my own and started Hipster Consulting. At peak I employed seven engineers and artists. In 2016 we took a shot at developing specialized hardware for the VR / medical industry that ultimately ran out of funding. After closing the studio doors I returned to working as a contractor and freelancer in 2018.

• Focused on solving difficult problems that most companies could not find internal solutions for.
• Commited to Laravel as our primary backend technology, occasionally working in Yii, CakePHP and a couple other platforms.
• Dozens and dozens of Wordpress sites. Anyone that has been responsible for employee salaries can probably relate to this. So much Wordpress.
• During this time I also acted as the first CTO for Ceek.com, a VR content firm.
• As a part of our VR startup work, I became adept at 3D printing (FDM) technologies. Our army of Lulzbot TAZ5 and 6 printers ran near 24/7 for a couple of years.

Director of I.T., Pierce County Community Newspaper Group

Saddle Ranch Productions developed advertising content for out-of-home signage systems, as well as selling space in a large network of signage locations across North America. Our division was created to develop and automated distribution system for this signage system but quickly expanded.

• Design and maintain in-house and customer web sites, including the W.N.P.A. Award Winning TacomaWeekly.com.
• Manage all I.T. requirement for both in-house needs as well as several partner location. This included approximately 50 mixed client systems and their associated applications, networks and hardware.
• Provide training and support for Adobe InDesign, Photoshop and Premier.
• Developed several internal intranet application for the Puyallup Tribe's Education Department.

Vice President, Saddle Ranch Productions

Saddle Ranch Productions developed advertising content for out-of-home signage systems, as well as selling space in a large network of signage locations across North America. Our division was created to develop and automated distribution system for this signage system but quickly expanded.

• Founded the Advanced Media division, delivering content via websites and out of home signage systems.
• Brought web development for film division in-house, delivering a savings of $172,500 in the first year versus the cost of outsourcing to design firm.
• Created content delivery system for national digital signage network supporting over 3700 display assets in 740 locations. This reduced signage operating costs by $370,000 per year with an initial capital cost of $39,000.
• Managed all I.T. requirement for both in-house needs as well as several partner studios. This included Windows, Mac OS X and Linux systems and their associated applications, networks and hardware.

Software Developer, TB Consulting

TB Consulting was a small firm that supported a specialized Cobol application for Boeing, Raytheon and a few other manufacturers. I was hired to convert from a mainframe application to an ASP.Net / C# web application. This was a standard three tier architecture and ended on completion.

• Convert Cobol business logic to C#.
• Migrate VSAM to Microsoft SQL Server databases.
• Automated migrating data from old to new system.
• Developed frontend / web UI for new application.

Database Administrator, Zillow

At Zillow I was a database admin responsible for production Microsoft SQL Server systems as well as the preproduction, staging and test environments. This included not just performance diagnosis and tuning but data migrations from build to production while the site was live.

• Provide DBA services for all of our database systems.
• Performance analysis and tuning.
• Ensure backups are good and disaster recovery plan stays up to date.
• DBA for the MySQL Ad Analytics Cluster.

Implementation Engineer, Expedia Inc.

At Expedia I initially came in to work in their lab and test teams to help automate several costly and time consuming processes. After my first year with the company I moved over to a new data integrity team where we did deep investigations into customer transactions to help solve customer support, legal or marketing questions.

• Provided Tier 3 escalation point for multiple teams within the company.
• Engineered and successfully released VMWare Server migration project, moving lower performance development and testing systems to virtualized hardware saving $600k per year in hardware costs.
• Developed lab and datacenter automation platform.
• Custom analytics and reporting from our data warehouse to various business units.

Engineer, Microsoft, Various Contracts

From 2000 to 2005 I contracted to a variety of Microsoft teams supporting internal and external facing systems and applications. This includes very large scale web properties as well as internal infrastructure systems.

• Automated datacenter tasks, such as mass-imaging of servers, remote re-IP operations and patching.
• Created system management application allowing self service of common tasks for end users, reducing wait time and increasing customer satisfaction.
• Developed customized Siebel reporting solution to provide specific metrics required for budgeting and capacity planning.
• Scripted build processes, early work in continuous integration and testing systems.

Long Term Budget Committee Member, Steilacoom Historic School District

Helped develop long term budget plan (10 - 20 year) with my local school district.

IT Person, GeekGirlCon

GeekGirlCon celebrates women in science, tech, gaming, comics, and more through an annual convention in Seattle, WA and other events. I developed the first iteration of their website and helped setup custom layouts for their various social media environments.