Xennial Innovations Inc.

In my current accountability, I have been deeply immersed in the role of Community Manager for Xennial Innovations, a position that requires a unique blend of communication prowess and community-building finesse. 

My days are filled with dynamic tasks, from crafting engaging newsletters using ClickUp to keeping our growing community of developers well-informed and visually captivated, to managing the vibrant conversations within our Discord server.

One of my key responsibilities involves wielding the power of social media, particularly on platforms like Twitter and LinkedIn. 

I've honed the art of developing and executing strategic social media plans to enhance our brand visibility and foster meaningful connections with our audience.

In addition to my digital endeavors, I take pride in orchestrating community events that transcend the virtual realm. Whether it's a virtual gathering or an in-person meetup, I've been the driving force behind planning, coordinating, and executing events that bring our community together.

My role extends beyond the digital space—I've become a regular face at industry meetups, conferences, and events. Attending these gatherings has not only allowed me to represent our brand but has also provided invaluable opportunities to network with like-minded individuals, industry professionals, and potential partners.

This opportunity has been a journey of growth, creativity, and proactive engagement. 

I've fostered a sense of belonging within our community, ensuring that every interaction is not just informative but also enriching. It's been a thrilling experience contributing to the evolution and success of our community, and I look forward to many more months of building connections, organizing events, and shaping a thriving digital ecosystem.

Community Manager

TechTarget

I love writing about technical topics, and writing for TechTarget and TheServerSide has given me an opportunity to learn about a wide array of technical topics, while getting the opportunity to interview and work with experts and leaders in the field.

However, writing is only part of my passion. 

The other big thing that motivates me is working hard to get my message out to as wide an audience as possible. Which is why I take Search Engine Optimization so seriously.

I have over a dozen #1 ranked articles on Google on highly competitive keywords pertaining to Java, Agile, Scrum and Cloud Computing. 

In fact, my articles often rank multiple times on the landing page of Google for competitive keywords. I will often have 3 or 4 videos on the landing page of Google's video tab. That's SEO done right!

Technical Writer and SEO Expert

IngramSpark

When I went to pursue my Scrum Master and Product Owner certifications, I realized there was a real void in the market with respect to resources that guided the learner's path. This motivated me to write and publish the Scrum Master Certification Guide, a 325 hardcover book available on Amazon and bookstores everywhere.

I would love to be able to take full credit for the book, but I simply can't. It was a true team effort in which a community of experts came together to produce a product that I'm infinitely proud of.

Pulling together a network of experts from my social media accounts, meetup groups, industry connections and even friends and family, I built a team of people who were experts on a variety of topics including:

- Content writing
- Book publishing
- Marketing
- Email campaigns
- Image editing
- Scrum and Agile knowledge

The team helped with every aspect of the book, including technical oversight of the content. Editors and contributors corrected for nuance, edited for clarity and quite often fully rewrote chapters to show me a better way to express an idea or concept.

As I said, my name is on the cover of the book, which is most humbling, because it's the team who pulled the project together that deserves the credit, and I'm forever greatful for the team's effort.

To be honest, this book is perhaps the big reason I want to work in the field of team building and community management, because I've seen the power of a highly-motivated, self-managed team, and I've seen first hand how a group of talented developers create outcomes that are exponentially greater than the sum of their individual parts.

Author of the Best Selling Scrum Master Certification Guide

Linode

The people at Linode are the greatest people you could possibly work with!

As a Developer Advocate for Linode, I have assisted the social media team in content creation, product promotion and video publishing on YouTube.

I don't want to take undue credit for Linode's success, but after publishing my first video about Docker, which spoke about Python, nginx and Java, Linode's YouTube channel quickly gained 340,000 subscribers and surpassed the million follower milestone.

(Honestly, my content really had nothing to do with that, but given the timing, I'm happy to take credit for it *smile*)

Developer Advocate

Working to promote IBM's #TodaysArchitect initiative, I helped bring awareness to the community about how the the IBM Z System mainframes can be used to help accellerate work in the areas of intensive computing, including:

- Artificial Intelligence
- Machine Learning
- Data Science

The engagement included the creation of video content used to promote IBM mainframes, promotion across all of my social media channels, participation in media events, outreach and content planning.

Trend Micro

If you think Trend Micro is just about anti-virus software you'd be completely wrong.

Trend Micro has expanded far beyond its humble beginnings as an OS security platform into the industry's leading internet security platform. Sometimes people need to be reminded of this fact, which is why I was recruited as a Developer Advocate to help spread the message.

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

To be clear, this is not a paid position like the others listed in the 'Experience' section of LinkedIn. However, being a community builder has taught me a great deal about how online communities are built and fostered, and that's a big part of my journey, so I feel it's fair to list it here. 

The AWS Community Builder program is a community-driven initiative by Amazon Web Services (AWS) to recognize and support individuals who are passionate about AWS and actively contribute to the AWS community. 

The typical roles and activities associated with an AWS Community Builder include:

- Community Advocacy
- Content Creation
- Knowledge Sharing
- Mentorship
- Feedback Loops
- Collaboration
- Evangelism
- Continuous Learning
- Community Events
- Visibility and Recognition

The AWS Community Builders program does not constitute employment with Amazon. It is instead a community of highly motivated individuals who want to spread positivity and enthusiasm about modern technologies and new approaches to DevOps based deployments.

Community Builder

Scrumtuous Inc

Founder

Lean? Agile? Goal-oriented?

That's me, and that's why I'm here spreading my love for effective product development with Scrum and other proven techniques that work within the Scrum framework.

And how am I spreading this love?

In a variety of ways, but the one I'm most proud of is my recently published Scrum Master Certification Guide. It's a real book, over 200 pages long and available in both hardcover and softcover on Amazon.

The feedback and reviews have been great so far, and it really warms my heart when I get messages from people telling me it helped them learn Scrum, get Agile and of course, gain a coveted PSM, PSPO or CSM designation.

I'm also very active on Twitter and YouTube.

I'm up above 250,000 followers on Twitter, and I think I've posted close to 100 videos about DevOps, cloud computing, Java programming, Python development and of course Agile and Scrum on my YouTube channel.

I've also been honored to work as a developer advocate with incredible and amazing companies including:

- Linode
- Xennial Innovations
- IBM and;
- Trend Micro

It's honestly quite humbling to be associated at all with such amazing leaders in the industry.

I'd love it if you both followed me on LinkedIn and connected.

I'm just at the start of my journey, and I'm excited to see where it all leads. 

Let's build something great together, and let's do it publicly!

I absolutely love talking about the challenges I face and the successes I've enjoyed with other like-minded and highly-motivated individuals. So let's share!

Darcy DeClute

Kristine Simmermon

Continued

Senior Product Manager - Strategy & Growth

Led the requirements gathering for Subscriptions and Billing for a new B2C SaaS platform, including creating and adhering to quarterly OKRs and a rolling 6 month roadmap

Researched and led initiative to replace the subscription management engine to reduce development time and save company expenditures

Acted as the liaison between product, IT, and sales teams to understand customer demand for new features and prioritize the product roadmap

Created user story acceptance criteria to get buy-in from stakeholders and refined those stories with Scrum teams

Worked cross-functionally with executive leadership and marketing teams to understand customer pain-points and translate them into actionable user stories

Replaced live webinar service resulting in a savings of over $60k in one year and 350 hours of production effort

Mentored junior level product team members

Senior Product Manager

Filevine

Lead and grew existing migration team by 75%

Added 3rd party and home-grown automation tools to reduce migration scripting/testing time to reduce customer wait time for data migration

Created new and improved current processes between sales/integrations/migration/customer resulting in a 20% increase in the intake process for customers

Created and presented rolling roadmap and team goals/progress to monthly board meeting

Director of Data Migration

Metal Toad

0-1 Product Development

Managing product development through the software development process from RFP to Discovery to Development and Support/Maintenance.

Creating stakeholder alignment through roadmaps, sprint reports, story mapping, and MVP prioritization.

Clients include: Intel, Daimler Trucking North America, Sony Pictures, LA Philharmonic, and more

Product Manager

Nike

As part of the Privacy Program team,  the Accountability team is responsible for reporting on and holding Nike Digital engineering teams accountable for implementing privacy compliant applications and services.

Privacy Accountability Manager

The Privacy Engineering Team creates, implements, and supports services to streamline and standardize Privacy for experiences and applications across the Consumer Digital Technology realm.

I developed requirements for privacy microservices - launched 3 services in 6 months, which were used by all of Nike Digital experiences

I developed user stories, guided strategy, managed team backlog, reviewed process documentation, and delivered roadmap priorities to senior leadership and Legal team.

I regularly met with stakeholders Nike-wide to assist with integrations and clarifying requirements and timelines for future integration work and presented to Nike engineering and architecture teams on our services, to increase knowledge and adoption.

Technical Project/Product Manager

Digital Content Framework 

The DCF team's mission is to create a framework for the Content Management System (CMS) that is secure, reliable, available, stable and scalable for the future. Build a flexible set of custom tools that enable engaging consumer experiences, connecting consumers to the Brand and ultimately drive conversion. Make the tools easy to use and drive operational efficiencies throughout our product. Empower and guide Global Digital DTC teams to use these tools to tell premium stories across all geographies.

As part of the Global Store Initiative and beyond, I helped to define and drive strategy, coordinate with stakeholders, define and drive features, perform product analysis, perfom cross - capability management, work with engineering to obtain LOE, manage product backlog, gather requirements, create and maintain documentation, write and present stories, work with engineers to clarify stories and coordinate reviews, partner with QA, accept completed stories, prioritize bugs, and coordinate UAT.



Consumer Profile Capability

As part of the Consumer Profile Capability, our mission was to bring consistency to the consumer by presenting a consistent consumer identity, unifying authentication and authorization technologies, providing robust account management services, providing access to rich consumer data to our experiences, and providing consultative services to Digital as a whole.

As a Business Analyst, I helped in the creation of a unified profile framework and foundation, which enables delivery of a single, common, consistent user experience and real time services to support personalization.

Product Owner/Senior Business Systems Analyst (consultant with Axian)

Cerner Corporation (contractor through Triple I Corporation)

Contracted for Delphi project - company-wide CRM initiative

Elicited and documented requirements, managed and executed test plans with remote and local QA resources, collaborated with system architects, developers, project managers, and multiple departments to analyze documents and data for requirements spanning multiple release cycles.

Agile/Scrum environment

Solutions Designer/Business Analyst(Consultant)

Allora Health an Intouch Solutions Company

Requirements gathering, creating technical requirements documents, screen mock-ups, prototyping, data flow diagrams, documentation of system, process documentation, end user documentation

Agile/scrum development environment

Managed the requirements gathering and documenting for version 2.0 for Allora and Allora Docs, iPad applications for the pharmaceutical industry.

Business Systems Analyst

WaterTRAC

0-1 product development - water management system for oil/gas industry

Gathered detailed requirements and managed development of entire system rewrite in 6 months

Established strong communication channels with internal stakeholders and beta users on the platform

Collaborated with sales and marketing on product rollout and deliverables.

Product Owner/UI Developer

Digital Smartworks

Website, mobile and software development consulting. .Net development, specializing in DotNetNuke website portals.  

I also manage all aspects of the company's marketing plan, as well as the administrative side of the business.  Implemented a social network marketing plan in 2010.

Digital Smartworks has served a variety of industries with software and/or web solutions, including the oil/gas industry, banking, gaming software, non-profit, health and fitness, law, local governmental agencies, and human resources.

I manage client projects from requirements gathering through development and maintenance, if required.  I gather requirements, make recommendations, compile detailed SOWs, demos and wireframe mockups or screen shots as necessary, and manage the project and any outside resources needed.

Web Engineer/Project Manager

Girls on the Run of Greater Kansas City 

I was the director for this local branch of the national organization called Girls on the Run.  Duties include managing/recruiting volunteers, training coaches, promoting the organization to the community, maintaining relationship with participating schools and participants, financial and administrative duties as needed, writing grants, recruiting corporate sponsors, working with the board of directors to create and uphold the strategic plan.

I successfully won a $20,000 startup grant in 2007 and grew the organization from 6 girls to over 150 in 3 years.  Implemented processes and procedures to ensure smooth running of the program, which is coached entirely by volunteers and managed also by a board of directors.

I developed, hosted, and maintained the website on a pro bono basis and managed one other part-time staff member and a host of volunteer coaches, race helpers, and community volunteers.

Council Director

Afterpoint, Inc.

Freelance web developer specializing in new/small business websites.  Skills included HTML, CSS, c#, and specializing in custom Dotnetnuke portal systems.

Merged with Black Dot Software, LLC in 2008 to create Digital Smartworks, LLC.

Web Developer/Owner

From ideation to launch and beyond, I am the voice of the customer. Certified in both strategic and agile product management, I have spanned many industries and markets, learning about current and future customers, in order to create lovable products that customers want and generate revenue that companies need. I believe the keys to success involve having a shared understanding of a vision and goals across team and departments, as well as specific, detailed, and deliberate communication to ensure alignment.

taplio

The Battle

Darcy DeClute

Kristine Simmermon

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