2021-2023 • Learning how Grafana actually works, contributing to real features, growing from individual contributor to someone ready to lead
The foundation years at Grafana. Learning how dashboards actually work, contributing to features people use every day, and slowly figuring out what I was good at.
Learning how Grafana actually works while contributing to features people use every day
Started diving into how Grafana's dashboards actually work. Every bug fix and feature taught me something about building things that millions of people actually use.
Started the accessibility working group—my first time trying to lead something. Realized that good code means caring about users who navigate differently than you do.
Led features like search and folder management, working with people across different teams. Contributed to release automation that made deployments less painful for everyone. Started helping newer team members find their way.
Handled urgent issues from big customers—performance problems, weird bugs, things breaking in production. Each fire drill taught me how the code I write affects real people doing real work.
From "why isn't this component rendering?" to understanding how dashboards work when millions of people use them. Learned that making things fast isn't just about clever code—it's about making people's jobs easier.
Started just writing code, but kept noticing things that bugged me—our site was hard to navigate with a keyboard, releases were a pain, new people looked lost. Turns out fixing those things was leadership practice.
Started seeing how everything connects—when customers complain, it's usually because we missed something in the code. When you automate one annoying process, suddenly everyone's day gets a little better. Small changes ripple out in ways you don't expect.
From starting the accessibility working group to helping with release automation—I learned that impact comes from caring about the humans using our tools.
Two years of solid contributions: led features like Search & Folder Management, started the accessibility working group, helped with release automation, and handled customer issues. The progression from individual contributor to someone ready for leadership was clear.