Mikey Williams
Hi, I'm Mikey!
I'm a senior developer, technical coach, community organizer, facilitator, and artist.
I host group spaces to empower others, not only in a technical or strategic sense, but also a cultural or caring sense. I prioritize the well-being of my community (and myself), which feeds into the strength of my projects.
I've undergone a wide arc of experiments in reinventing wheels, from playing with new technology stacks to playing with social business structures to playing with cultural memes, I have a deep understanding of how things work, I've made enough mistakes to learn how to choose my battles.
I now want to use my skills to lead teams in delivering value to meet clear outcomes.
Skills
- effective at amplifying junior and intermediate developers with technical and organizational support and coaching
- strong at communicating complex technical concepts using only simple and accessible terms
- confident in leading teams into uncharted territories, deconstructing intractable problems, creating legible maps, spinning up strategic work streams for other developers, supporting the team as we adapt along our journey together
- understand JavaScript web app stacks from top to bottom by reinventing the wheels multiple times
- practiced in circumspect group facilitation, from everyday meetings to project retrospectives to community engagement to long-term company retreats
- proficient with JavaScript, Rust, Ruby (on Rails), Python, Clojure, and C
- performant in using decentralized platforms (Scuttlebutt, Dat, IPFS, Bitcoin) and web technologies (React, Angular, HTML & CSS) to quickly create accessible, responsive, and magical user-centric apps
- skilled in using Linux systems for every occasion, from personal use to adminstration, from scaling infrastructure (Docker Swarm or Kubernetes or Salt Stack) to managing a local system (Debian, Bash, Systemd)
- adept in hardware systems for a variety of purposes, from programming microcontrollers to small Linux computers, from designing 3d models to circuit boards, while keeping in mind the entire deployment lifecycle from manufacturing to maintainence
References
I'm writing to recommend Mikey as a human for you to work with. Mikey is hands down my top pick of people I would hire to work with if I could (I'm really critical, and this is not hyperbole)
Here's my experience of working with Mikey.
... read more ...
I feel very lucky to have worked with Mikey on the Minded Web App. His enthusiasm for code is infectious. His ability and willingness to tackle hard problems amazed me. Mikey was a very supportive and patient mentor. He pushed me to solve problems at the edges of my comfort zone with kindness and was enthusiastic about walking me through problems I struggled with. He is also a wonderful human to work with, who will always prioritize people care before solving technical problems, creating a productive and enjoyable work environment.
Mikey has been my teammate for the past two years, and he's played a big part in shaping the team's culture, technical capabilities, and strategic direction. He works with a great degree of care and consideration to match his impressive technical expertise. So not only is he a fantastic developer, he's an active community member and facilitator. His ties and contributions to the Enspiral, SSB and open-source communities speak to this point. I strongly endorse Mikey as a coworker and all-round human being.
I know Mikey has excellent technical skills, but what first comes to mind for me is his character. He is attentive, caring, patient, creative, and self-aware. He moves from a place of deep integrity and curiosity. I trust him absolutely, and can recommend him without reservation. He will deliver exceptional work while elevating the performance of his team. Mikey is one of those rare birds that combines technical excellence with emotional intelligence. And he is a great dancer
Current Work
May 2020 to present
July 2014 to present
- every week, host a safe space for creatives to gather, show, converse, and jam
- starting with Winter 2018, every quarter, host a public expo that is half art exhibition and half live performances
- provide a point of introduction for newbies who want to join
- manage the vibe, promote friendly behavior, and be ready for unsafe behavior
- support others with their projects, whether improvisational music, live-coded visuals, reactive lights, singing, drawing, dancing, crochet, reading, sewing, conversing, etc
Prior Work
August 2014 to ???
- lead the (Rusty) Sunrise Choir team, an effort to evolve Scuttlebutt beyond a working prototype into a more serious project with an improved core protocol (in Rust), with developer friendliness (accessibility & maintainability), well-specified behaviors, well-described designs, well-documented functionality, well-coordinated teams, better release processes
- self-funding $60k USD to support 2 developers full-time for 6 months
- lead by example on a culture of welcoming newbies with friendly open questions
- support swarm of technical developers, sharing relevant information across parallel work streams, hosting office hours, providing code reviews, and giving feedback
- act as a project "elder", am on the governance team to distribute our most recent funding, the Handshake Grant
- act as the "cypherhistorian / cryptoarcheologist / peerlibrarian": curating existing knowledge, organizing links, giving talks, routing humans on where they can discover the answers they seek
- lead a team to build PeachCloud
, a hardware product focused on Scuttlebutt infrastructure-as-a-service
- maintain the original scuttlebutt.nz (now handbook.scuttlebutt.nz) website to share more than the "what" and "how" of technical documentation: the "why" of cultural principles
May 2019 to May 2021
- lead a small development team to build a React website, a React Native mobile app, and a Ruby on Rails backend
- integrate with legacy banking systems to manage incoming and outgoing financial settlements
- expose, document, and maintain an API for merchant payment devices to integrate with our payments system
May 2016 to December 2018
- maintained technical principles, stacks, and assets for team of 7 developers
- facilitated team meetings, away days, and retreats to unpack latent senses and re-pack into coherent strategy
- organize and adapt team processes to support productive work from healthy and happy humans
- developed full-stack JavaScript frameworks, one from scratch, one from existing libraries, used by the team on real-world projects
- delivered value for clients and delightful software for users:
Open Source Mad Science
July 2013 to May 2016
- learned by mad science how to build magical web apps in any and all stacks
- learned by mistakes how to manage contracts for web development work
- lead a research team for a developing a suite of modular tools amongst the Open App Ecosystem
- built the alpha release of Cobudget, a software platform to facilitate groups in collaborative funding
- learned simplicity-oriented design principles for developing powerful yet simple tools
- founded the Value Flows project to develop a shared vocabulary for interoperable economic network software
- learned how to faciliate the Craftworks network of freelancers, to provide support for spaces in between the contract work
Network Manager @ Berkeley Student Cooperative
July 2012 to June 2014
- designed, deployed, managed, and maintained a wired and wiresless computer network for a house of 150 students
Student @ University of California, Berkeley
August 2010 to June 2013
- studied Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Network Engineering Assistant @ UC Berkeley Network Operations and Services
January 2012 to April 2013
- wrote software to facilitate the job of the team I was originally hired for
September 2011 to June 2012
- designed club structure and organized with early members
- presented on security topics with attendances of over 50 people
- made challenges to promote hands-on learning of security
January 2011 to ~ 2013
- held office hours to help students utilize avaiable computer infrastructure
- introduced to the beauty of Linux system administration
Engineering Intern @ Northrop Grumman - Aerospace Systems
June 2010 to January 2012
- designed, produced, and maintained software to facilitate engineer's diagnostics of hardware development
- based on success of Summer 2011 work, asked to continue working part-time throughout the year