Brandon Hall

Director of Engineering



// About Me

Engineering leader with deep experience working on complex, enterprise grade B2B2C products.

12 years of experience in forward-thinking frontend development.

Passionate about UX.

Possesses strong work ethic, pays attention to details, and enjoys solving hard problems.

Always using the best tool for the job instead of trying to reinvent the wheel.

// Experience

EveryoneSocial

May 2018 - Present

Director of Engineering

Leading frontend engineering and QA for tens of thousands of daily active users. Managing a team of frontend and QA engineers with a constant focus on delivering product, mentoring, and expanding test coverage.

Working closely with the product team and executives to define scope and allocate resources for our cycles (see The Shape Up Method). Consistent retros and 1-on-1s with direct reports and related staff to improve our process and learn from our mistakes. We focus on delivery in our cycles to ensure we're always delivering.

Responsible for ensuring our NowSecure security report is nearly flawless while addressing critical/high dependency vulnerabilities as soon as possible via proactive security monitoring. I also monitor our core web vitals to look for anomalies while ensuring performance remains consistent.


EveryoneSocial

June 2018 - July 2021

Lead Frontend Developer

After returning to EveryoneSocial, I architected and rebuilt the entirety of our web application using TypeScript, React, Apollo, and Webpack. We used Material UI as the UI framework and eventually migrated from Apollo to React Query to interact with the GraphQL API hosted on AWS AppSync. Additionally, we rolled out Cypress for frontend integration tests which we eventually scrapped for Robot and Selenium.

Delivered dozens of features including feeds, posting, sharing, admin analytics, and many more. Worked closely with the CEO, design lead, and the backend team to define scope and ship features using Jira and CircleICI.

Designed the frontend technical test on HackerRank which I used to screen, interview, and hire several engineers.

Oversaw and contributed to development of our React Native app and delivered feature parity in several areas.


Kissmetrics

May 2016 - May 2018

Software Engineer

Lead engineer on cornerstone “Campaigns” feature which includes a rich-text, drag-and-drop editor built using React and DraftJS. Campaigns also contains an HTML Editor built on top of Ace. The various campaign and message reports are displayed using Recharts which is built on top of D3.

Architected and built Alliioop product using React, Mobx, Material-UI, Babel 7, and Webpack 4. Tests are written using Jest. Dropped initial payload from 4.5MB to 1.2MB (340K gzip) with aggressive code-splitting and tree-shaking.

Built “Activity Report” feature which allows customers to explore multiple levels of customer segmentation.

Rebuilt “Funnel Report” using React and component-based CSS which allows users to visualize sales funnels.

Migrated Acceptance Tests from Capybara to a Node.js app running Codecept.js.


EveryoneSocial

May 2013 - May 2016

Senior Frontend Developer

Architected and built the entirety of EveryoneSocial’s admin and user facing web apps.

Both apps were powered by Backbone, jQuery, Bootstrap, SCSS, and Handlebars. Tests were written with Jasmine.

Continual improvements to UX and feature iterations with the product team boosted user engagement.

Features included: user and content tagging, file uploads, permission based content management, and masonry layouts.

Built HubSpot driven sales site which helped us grow, albeit in a small part, from one enterprise customer to fifty.

Delivered cross-platform mobile apps using Cordova.


Clipboard

Jan 2012 - April 2013

Software Developer

Built HTML5 Mobile Web app using Backbone and jQuery Mobile for Clipboard’s 140K users. Constructed “Find Friends” UI and backend Node.js connections to Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Gmail.

Built Facebook Open Graph application with permission management for seamless social sharing.

Added file upload feature (multiple queued uploads and drag and drop) using a forked version of jQuery File Upload.


TriForce Marketing

2009 - 2012

Technical Team Lead

Built CurationSoft (desktop software) using ActionScript which was distributed via Adobe Air. Transformed Blog Success from a one-page membership site into a social community with Drupal.

Integral part of growing company from $350K to over $1M in revenue. Modest exit in 2012.

Managed numerous software and website development projects across the company.

Designed and implemented sales funnels, marketing systems, and follow-up sequences.


TriForce Marketing

2006 - 2008

Affiliate Manager

Formed dozens of new relationships with email list owners, and trained hundreds of affiliates in a group setting.

Grew affiliate base by 200% while raising affiliate engagement by 50%.

// Recommendations

Cameron Brain

CEO @ EveryoneSocial

“Brandon worked with our team for a bit over three years first as a contractor, later transitioning to full time. In short, Brandon is both a strong developer and a fantastic team member, especially for distributed organizations like ours. His productivity, self-direction, communication, professionalism, and downright great attitude continue to serve as a model for us and our future hires. Any org (especially a startup) would be fortunate to have him as a member of their team.”


Gary Flake

CTO of Search @ Salesforce

“Brandon has been a fantastic remote extension to our team. He built several of our social media / email connectors with very little interaction from us. He then became familiar with our code base and integrated the new solution. We were so happy with the results, that we retained him to build our HTML5 mobile site. He did every aspect of it, including some design work, and we were very pleased with the results. He is easy to work with, has a great work ethic, and is someone with whom I would be delighted to work with again.”


Mike Madlang

VP Product Management @ EveryoneSocial

“From our 1st ever enterprise client, to our 50th, Brandon was a critical component to our company's success. Entirely managing our front-end, he helped lead the way to what became the most intuitive platform in our market. Brandon displayed an unmatched level of fortitude and endurance, and our platform still benefits from his hard work.”


Mark Dawson

Lead Member of Technical Staff @ Saleforce

“I worked with Brandon at clipboard.com where he implemented a number of features, from a backend node.js based social authentication and publishing feature, to a front end HTML5 mobile site, based on backbone.js and bootstrap. Brandon's work was always of a high quality, time and time again he would impress me with his ability to work remotely on a feature with limited guidance and also simultaneously keep in sync with other feature work and refactoring that was affecting his work.

As well as having strong technical abilities, Brandon also showed a really good eye for design, with the clipboard.com mobile site being a good example of his attention to design detail. I would highly recommend Brandon to anyone in need of a solid developer.”


Gerry Kaplan

Founder/CEO @ ImpairMaster

“I hired Brandon as a user interface engineer specializing in browser technologies including JavaScript, Backbone.js, Require.js, along with numerous other supporting libraries. Brandon exhibited expert characteristics by completing assignments on-time and within budget.

In addition, and possibly most importantly, Brandon has a technical aptitude that enables him to self-learn new technologies quickly (and eagerly). He is very easy to work with and very honest. Overall, working with Brandon was a very positive experience and I would hire him again without hesitation.”


// Contact

// Tech Skills

Languages


JavaScript
HTML
JSX
CSS
TypeScript
Ruby
Python

Libraries


React
jQuery
Mobx
Backbone
Material UI
Bootstrap
Redux

Frameworks


Node.js
Rails
Meteor
Ember
Polymer

Tools


Mocha
Jasmine
Jest
Babel
Webpack

// Open Source

WebStorage.js

Small wrapper for the Web Storage API which provides safe access to localStorage and sessionStorage.

// Key Skills

Leader

Actively coaches, teaches, and trains fellow team members. Moreover, continually communicates the vision of a product or project so fellow team members always understand the underlying motivations.


Communicator

Comfortable working and communicating with diverse groups of people situated throughout the world. Actively tries to embrace cultural contrasts so all involved are content and comfortable.


Manager

Managed large-scale software and web development projects through numerous versions over a span of several years. Possesses experience with budgeting and hiring as well as hands-on management.


Self-Starter

Worked on distributed teams with no in-house supervision for several years. Proven self-motivator that understands the importance of managing autonomy while producing exceptional results.

// Education

Pellissippi State, Management

1998 - 2000

Completed courses in information technology, computer science and management as well as core classes.

// Things I Love

  Open Source


  Google Apps


  StackOverflow


  Git


  JetBrains Software


  Evernote


// Interests

  Traveling


  Unique Food


  Politics


  Investing


  Stand-Up Comedy