Testimonials
Some of my consulting clients have liked my work so much, they offered to write me a testimonial! Here are a few people who have some very nice things to say about me.
“Approachable, flexible, and personable”
Our engineering team was doing a great job remediating our site to meet accessibility requirements for an agreement. However, without the optics on how we were doing, it was going to be difficult to build confidence around the results. We had a tool which could crawl our site to give us a temperature check, but the work on that tool was not finished, and we did not have the resources or the right expertise to adjust the tool for our needs. We called DB.
DB was able to ramp up quickly and dedicate himself entirely to the project. He worked closely with the Accessibility team, and made sure to get regular feedback on his progress. We were delighted with his work: not only did we get all the features they needed, but DB suggested new features that we didn't even notice we needed. Tight feedback loops lead to a better result, and DB’s suggestions improved our ability to prevent accessibility issues from happening in the first place.
DB left behind code that we could pick up and maintain. He documented his work and trained up employees before our engagement was over. While working on it, he was sure to kill bugs quickly, which kept our tech debt costs low. He also refactored the code that better-utilized the libraries we depend on. DB also suggested some more fundamental changes that we did not have the time to address, but taking the time to describe those recommendations means that we can tackle them later if we decide to. It also showed us that DB was willing to work with the product according to our parameters, even if they were not what DB would have built on his own.
I’d recommend DB to anyone, and I wish we had been able to keep him longer! He asks the important, fundamental questions about how to approach goals, but he’s also pragmatic enough to make sure the immediate problem gets solved. He stays focused on the customer, making sure that the end result is what they want. He’s also approachable, flexible, and personable — that makes it very easy to work with him and make any adjustments as the product & the market evolves.
Ben Patterson, Engineering Manager at edX
“The intention of your feedback was to create a better outcome”
Q: What were biggest obstacles when initially deciding to work with me?
A: Engaging with a contractor is always a big risk. There are so many unknown factors that could make it a bad investment:
- Is the contractor knowledgeable?
- Do they produce high quality work?
- Are they good collaborators?
- Will they be able to quickly get up to speed with the codebase?
We were lucky that we had worked with you in the past, so we had the answers to all of those questions: Yes.
Q: What did you like about working with me?
A: You said yes to every feature request, no matter how complicated. I could also tell that the intention of your feedback was to create a better outcome, not an attempt to get out of doing work that would require a lot of effort or would be more difficult.
I also liked working with you as a person. You have a very positive attitude. You’re patient and approachable. You’re also knowledgeable about everything related to software development; languages, frameworks, workflows, tools etc. It was refreshing to get your seasoned perspective on how our team operates — you made some good suggestions on how to improve our workflow!
Q: Would you recommend me to others? If so, why?
A: Absolutely. You do quality work, you are committed to finding the right solution, and you are fast, knowledgeable and efficient. I hope we can get another contract with you in the future!
Mark Sadecki, Accessibility Coordinator at edX