Ben Christel, Software Engineer
ben.christel@gmail.com
benchristel.com
Summary
Full-stack software engineer with over a decade of experience building web apps in TypeScript, Go, Ruby, and Java. I pragmatically apply TDD, type-driven design, FP, OOP, upfront design, and refactoring. My peers know me as a kind pair-programming partner, teacher, and incisive bug-finder.
Experience
| 2020–Present | Senior Software Engineer, Khan Academy, Palo Alto, CA (Remote): Worked full-stack on edtech web app with millions of users worldwide. Introduced XP practices to a team of 10 engineers. Led multiple projects improving accessibility of math exercises. Released a year-long rewrite project on time with no bugs. Spearheaded improvements to type safety, enabling safe, fast development of once-stagnant legacy code. |
| 2016–2020 | Staff Software Engineer, Pivotal R&D, Palo Alto, CA: Helped grow engineering teams by evaluating candidates, pair-programming with them during intensive, full-day interviews. Led development and release engineering teams for Greenplum Database and PKS. Developed and facilitated an interactive workshop to teach refactoring (github.com/benchristel/refactoring-workshop). |
| 2014–2016 | Software Engineer, Pivotal Labs, Palo Alto, CA: Taught XP practices to client teams, while working with them full-stack to rapidly deliver web and mobile applications. |
| 2012–2014 | Software Engineer, Groupon, San Francisco, CA: Architected maintainable, scalable Rails services for the Breadcrumb point-of-sale app. Eliminated customer-impacting disbursement delays in Q1 2014. Mentored new hires in TDD, Rails, and object-oriented design. Helped document best practices for development and operations. |
Education
| 2008–2012 |
Stanford University, Stanford, CA B.S., Computer Science, Civil Engineering minor |