Reflection: Second half of my fourth year at GitLab and becoming Staff

Fourth anniversary! When I started at GitLab, I was wondering if I’d be here for 2 years, let alone 4 and counting. If you haven’t read it yet, I recommend reading the reflection on the first half of my fourth year though it’s not necessary to know what I’ve been up to during the last 6 months specifically, which is covered here. Continue reading “Reflection: Second half of my fourth year at GitLab and becoming Staff”

Summary and Thoughts on Being/Becoming a Staff Support Engineer

I recently organized an AMA on Being and Becoming a Staff Support Engineer. This was meant to be similar to last year’s Being/Becoming a Senior Support Engineer. Normally, I would have actually waited longer to do it, since I only got promoted in February and I feel like I haven’t been working at the Staff level very long. However, at the end of May, our other Staff Support Engineer, Will Chandler was transferring to the development team. So, I decided before he transferred would be a good time to have the AMA. Additionally, I invited Drew Blessing, our first Staff Support Engineer (who had transferred to development a couple years ago) to also join the group of people answering questions.

This is not just a summary of the answers from that AMA session though. I’ve tried to put the answers and thoughts together with the previous video that I recorded with Lyle Kozloff while I was still working on becoming Staff, and some additional insights. Continue reading “Summary and Thoughts on Being/Becoming a Staff Support Engineer”

Evolution of the GitLab Support Portal landing page 2018-2022

While I touched on them in my first year and second year reflection blog posts, I didn’t really discuss the changes of the GitLab Support Portal landing page. So, I thought with the launch of the latest revision, it was the best time to put together a short blog post. Continue reading “Evolution of the GitLab Support Portal landing page 2018-2022”

Another Letter of Thanks

I recently refound my letter of thanks from 2016, and I thought 6 years meant it was long past due for another. Similar to the first one, I have thanked a lot of the people mentioned before, but putting it together in a single “letter” allows me to reflect on how their combined support helped me get to where I am today. Continue reading “Another Letter of Thanks”

Documentation is important in every organization: Writing down all the things

I’ve worked in many types of organizations though mostly in public and non-profit, and it seems particularly in smaller organizations, or in organizations where they’re not building products, documentation is not always seen as necessary. I once asked a manager to attend the Write the Docs conference and they didn’t think it was relevant to my job. Granted, writing documentation was not part of my job description, but I didn’t quite understand how they couldn’t see its importance. Documentation is not just about product documentation. Continue reading “Documentation is important in every organization: Writing down all the things”

Reflection: First half of my fourth year at GitLab and getting more involved

Normally, I post a reflection once a year, but so much has happened during the fourth year already that I felt the need to split it up into two and write about the first 6 months of my fourth year to make sure the reflection didn’t get too long.

If you’re a first time reader, I recommend reading at least the previous reflection post about my third year at GitLab for more context. Continue reading “Reflection: First half of my fourth year at GitLab and getting more involved”

Reflection on my CEO shadow rotation at GitLab

I spent 2 weeks being a CEO shadow at GitLab, and thought I’d reflect a bit on my experience. If you’d like a more thorough write up, check out Darren Murph’s takeaways and lessons learned blog post, or check out the CEO Shadow YouTube playlist. Continue reading “Reflection on my CEO shadow rotation at GitLab”

Summary and Thoughts on Being/Becoming a Senior Support Engineer at GitLab

Ever since becoming a Senior Support team member at GitLab, I’ve had various conversations about becoming and being a Senior level team member; even more so after I became a Senior Support Engineer (SSE). A couple of recent conversations made me realize that a lot of team members have questions and we should have a way to share the answers, so I organized “Ask Us Anything” (AUA) sessions on Being and Becoming a Senior Support Engineer. Continue reading “Summary and Thoughts on Being/Becoming a Senior Support Engineer at GitLab”