Dan Ford

Hi there! 👋

My name is Dan, and I'm a freelance software engineer, technology consultant, and coach/mentor based in Seattle, Washington, USA.

I spent 15 years working as a professional software engineer (most of it for Amazon and AWS, up to the Principal / Staff level), then in 2022 I decided to strike out on my own with a one-man consulting firm. In addition to my mentoring/coaching, I work part-time on other software projects that interest me, and the rest of the time is spent with my family (super cool wife and two awesome kids!) and hobbies.

During my time at Amazon/AWS, I participated in over 1,000 hiring panels as a "Bar Raiser". This special role meant that not only was I interviewing each candidate, but I did all the pre-interview planning (topics for each interviewer to cover), led the hiring panel discussion, guided the group to a hire/no-hire decision, and ultimately I could "veto" a candidate if I felt they were not right for Amazon in the long-term.

As a Bar Raiser, I also conducted "behavioral interviews" in addition to technical interviews within my own expertise (software engineering), meaning I was talking to each candidate, diving into their past experience, and evaluating how well they fit Amazon's "leadership principles" in a broad way. This meant I interviewed a broad range of candidates in addition to SDEs, such as SDE-Ts, QA Engineers, Technical Program Managers, Engineering Managers, Product Managers, and many others, from entry-level up to Principal / Staff (L4-L7).

I now leverage this unique experience to do a lot of "interview coaching" on the other side of the hiring desk, helping candidates to prepare for technical and behavioral interviews.

I offer both monthly mentorships as well as one-off sessions, and I'm happy to do whichever one fits your needs best.

Feel free to send me an inquiry if you have any questions!