I am a engineering leadership consultant. I focus on helping organizations and leaders create thriving successful engineering organizations.
Most recently I was a Senior Director of Engineering at Slack. While there I led product, platform, reliability, infrastructure, and SRE teams.
Before Slack I was the head of engineering at 18F where I helped to make US government software better from within. Before that I was the head of software engineering at PLOS, an open access scientific publisher. I was also a manager and software engineer at PDI/DreamWorks Animation, and a variety of small science and medicine related startups.
I've been developing software since 2000 in both hands-on and leadership roles. I am a pragmatic, transparent, results driven technologist who wants to help get work done. I thrive in team-oriented cultures where we're all working hard for a common goal.
I used to be a mechanical engineer. I attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology and earned a BS in Mechanical Engineering there. I still really enjoy making things with my hands.
I live with my family in San Francisco, CA.
Github: hollyallen
Linkedin: Holly Allen
IMDB: Holly Allen