Holly Gibson

1. Engineering Manager

   Jun 2026 – Present

   Aiven · Helsinki, Finland

   • Managing the engineering team responsible for OEM partnerships — helping cloud providers scale their DBaaS offerings.

2. Engineering Manager

   Jun 2025 – Nov 2025

   QOCO Systems Ltd · Espoo, Finland

   • Led engineering delivery for cloud-native SaaS products serving global aviation customers, accountable for technical quality, execution and stakeholder alignment.
   • Directed architecture decisions across React frontends and Node.js services, balancing delivery pace with maintainability.
   • Partnered with product owners and designers to translate complex aviation workflows into clear, usable interfaces.
   • Operated services on Azure AKS, coordinated messaging with Azure Service Bus, and maintained CI/CD in Azure DevOps.

3. Manager, Engineering Productivity

   Mar 2024 – Jun 2025

   Smartly · Helsinki, Finland

   • Drove process development within engineering operations, focused on measurement and continuous improvement.
   • Coached engineering managers on leadership practices and project management.
   • Trained teams and individuals in agile and lean principles, empowering them to self-organise and achieve autonomy.
   • Used DORA and SPACE frameworks to improve engineering operations excellence.
   • Facilitated the community of practice for engineering managers.

4. Engineering Manager

   Oct 2021 – Mar 2024

   Smartly · Helsinki, Finland

   • Led two teams totalling 16 developers — grew the first from one engineer to 7 in 6 months, then took on a second team.
   • Coached engineers across seniority levels — mentored a junior developer until he was hired externally as a senior; managed a structured PIP for a senior engineer.
   • Partnered with the Product Owner so teams shipped consistently without overcommitting during high growth.
   • Led a cross-team innovation week that shipped 20 customer-requested UX improvements in 5 days.
   • Stayed technical — led architecture reviews, contributed to the React/TypeScript codebase, and drove developer autonomy in technical decisions.

5. Engineering Team Lead

   Feb 2021 – Oct 2021

   Smartly · Helsinki, Finland

   • Hired 6 engineers in 6 months with a structured process, keeping the roadmap stable throughout.
   • Led development of React and TypeScript apps powering creative production tools used worldwide.
   • Guided technical initiatives from discovery to production while safeguarding codebase health.
   • Set a high bar for frontend architecture, testing and code quality.

6. Software Engineer

   Jul 2019 – Jan 2021

   Smartly · Helsinki, Finland

   • Built creative tools — image and video templates, asset library and creative performance insights — for customers scaling their advertising.
   • Shipped end-to-end features and built reusable UI components, internal tooling and shared libraries.
   • Designed and maintained Node.js microservices.
   • Worked with TypeScript, Node.js, PostgreSQL, MongoDB, Redis, React, Redux, FFmpeg, GreenSock, Kubernetes and Docker.

7. Developer

   Dec 2018 – Mar 2019

   Coachilla Ltd · Helsinki, Finland

   • Built user-facing features to improve engagement and discovery on a coaching platform.
   • Developed a JavaScript widget and improved the search UI used by end users.
   • Migrated the frontend from Ruby on Rails views to a modern Vue.js frontend.
   • Worked with non-relational data stores.

8. Developer

   Feb 2016 – Nov 2018

   Praxent · Austin, Texas

   • Bungalo Homes (2018), Frontend Team Lead — built a React app for real estate listings with filtered search and map APIs; shaped UI/UX with the designer and mentored junior developers.
   • ghSMART (2017), Lead Fullstack Developer — built an Electron + React desktop app for Windows and macOS talking to a Node.js API over websockets; designed local/cloud data syncing with NeDB and PostgreSQL.
   • MFE (2016), Fullstack Developer — built an Electron + Angular 2 tablet app integrating with scanner hardware, using RxJS and D3. Saved the client from potentially losing millions by discovering a manufacturing error in their scanner.
   • Scholar Snapp (2016), Frontend Team Lead / Fullstack — built a Node.js JSON API on PostgreSQL with an XML-schema REST API, architected the data schema, and led the Ember frontend team.

9. Founder / Director, Women Who Code Austin

   Jul 2013 – Jul 2018

   Women Who Code · Austin, Texas

   • Partnered with local tech companies to run networking events for developers and designers.
   • Taught coding workshops and coached women on their careers.
   • Spoke at local tech events and conferences; organised and judged hackathons.

10. Software Engineer

    Sep 2015 – Dec 2015

    BlackLocus · Austin, Texas

    • Contributed to major feature releases for a product analytics platform used by a large retail client.
    • Represented BlackLocus at local engineering outreach events.

11. Web Developer & Operations Lead

    Sep 2013 – Aug 2015

    Learning List · Austin, Texas

    • Worked closely with the CEO to define and execute the product roadmap.
    • Built and maintained a complex Rails application with search and discovery; optimised Elasticsearch indexing and queries.
    • Led and mentored junior developers while supporting production operations.

• Prompt Engineering & Programming with OpenAI
• AI Software Development: From First Prompt to Production Code
• Complete SQL Bootcamp

Award: Heroic Recognition

• Hack Reactor — Web Development2013
• The King’s University — B.T.S., Theology, Web Design2001 – 2006