Keizan Gus Shaffer

Experience

• 

  WCI Inc

  Interim Head of Engineering

  Mar 2024 - Jun 2024

  WCI Inc operates the largest carbon trading platform in the Americas.

  • Assessed sitting CTO and determined they were no longer a fit
  • Partnered with Product and Project Management leadership to improve visibility and accountability in engineering team
  • Improved Engineering team cohesion and broke down silos by implementing Agile life cycle
  • Hired permanent Head of Engineering
• 

  Prefect

  Advisor to the Head of Engineering

  Apr 2023 - Apr 2024

  Prefect is an data pipeline workflow automation platform. Offering best in class observability and orchestration to processes that are otherwise full of unneeded toil and error-prone.

  • Guided the Head of Engineering through multiple restructures
  • Reviewed and revised hiring strategy and artifacts for senior engineering positions
• 

  Amino Health

  Vice President of Engineering

  Jan 2022 - Sep 2023

  Amino is a digital health company leveraging data, design, and consumer-first thinking to help people get more out of their healthcare.

  • Restructured entire engineering team to bring greater velocity and accountability
  • Catalogued ten years worth of technical debt and compiled list of top priority technical projects
  • Engaged contractors to tackle data pipeline issues without bloating FTEs
  • Trained and mentored a cadre of new engineering managers
  • Successfully navigated restructuring six months into tenure.
• 

  Oregon Venture Fund

  Venture Partner

  Jan 2022 - Dec 2023

  The Oregon Venture Fund is a boutique VC focused on companies founded in Oregon and Southwest Washington. Our elite group of investors contributes time, expertise, capital, and connections to help founders gain access to the right people and resources to grow their business, their way.

  • Participated in due diligence for multiple Seed and A-round investments, focused on Platform as a Service and other SaaS B2B companies.
  • As a member of the OVF Champions team gave guidance to pre-seed founders
• 

  Micro Mentor

  Fractional Head of Engineering

  Jan 2021 - Dec 2021

  A small non-profit (and subsidiary of Mercy Corps), MicroMentor connects entrepreneurs with a lack of social capital (in developing countries as well as the US) with business mentors.

  • Hired Product Management advisors to develop a new product strategy
  • Facilitated the selection of a new vendor to replatform the product on a social SaaS
  • Navigated and mastered the intricacies and complications of working as part of a multi-national NGO
• 

  New Relic

  Senior Director of Engineering

  Aug 2014 - Mar 2021

  The creators of SaaS Application Performance Monitoring, New Relic is now an all-in-one observability platform.

  • Created the New Relic Core Data Platform Engineering Organization
  • Navigated reorganizations that impacted hundreds of engineering, rebuilding teams from the ground up
  • Hired, trained and mentored dozens of senior engineers and over half a dozen engineering managers
  • Was an active member of the New Relic Emergency Response Force, acting as a front line Incident Commander for global Severity 1 incidents and developing first-in-class incident management processes
  • Liaised directly with our largest customers to explain incidents and remediation plans, as well as advise on their own incident response process
• 

  RNA Networks / Dell

  Principal Software Engineer

  Jul 2008 - Jul 2014

  RNA Networks developed a storage and filesystem acceleration product that was purchased by Dell in June of 2011. Dell integrated RNA technology into their offerings as "Dell Fluid Cache"

  • Hired immediately after first round of funding to build RNA's core technology
  • Developed the technology for entirely new lines of business (low latency messaging, SAN acceleration)
  • Co-authored two patents
  • Was a senior participant in due diligence resulting in successful exit via acquisition
  • Onboarded and trained all new technical staff post-acquisition