I'm Brandon Valentine, but most folks in tech just call me bval. I have a giant beard, and am easily recognized by it.

I work hard to bring warmth, humor, and openness to everything I do and I seek those qualities in others.

I'm a Technical Account Manager at Workbrew. Becoming a full-time salesperson is a bit of a surprise to me, but evidently no surprise at all to the folks who know me well and have worked with me over the years. As Employee #9 at Workbrew, my responsibilities don't end there. I'm plugged in to our support and customer success motions as well. It's good to be back in startup mode, and I couldn't ask for a better team to do this with, nor a better opportunity than making Homebrew available inside companies large and small.

I still manage to write software for myself occasionally. I’m a polyglot programmer most comfortable in Ruby on Rails. I have worked for long stretches in Javascript, PHP, and Perl. I am an expert SQL developer and can write complex reporting queries comfortably and efficiently. I have done occasional smaller projects in many other platforms including C#/.NET, ObjC, and Swift. I have deep experience in UNIX systems administration and devops. I have worked with AWS extensively, and have written Puppet and Chef in multiple contexts.

I'm also a founding member of the Board of Directors at the Nashville Software School, a 501(c)3 non-profit vocational school. I have also served as one of the initial volunteer curriculum developers, and as an occasional guest lecturer and instructor. Since 2012 I have been honored to work with the Executive Director and other board members to oversee the organization’s growth into a self-sustaining, self-funded non-profit with thousands of graduates out in the workforce. Unlike many for-profit coding bootcamps, we offer scholarships to many of our students and bet on their future — receiving no remuneration unless they successfully land a job as a software developer. Our organization has transformed the already rich pool of software developers in Nashville with an even more diverse and growing group of talent.

You can find out more about my career, where I've been, and where I'm going on my LinkedIn profile. You're also welcome to contact me there if you are interested in what I'm up to, or want to know more about Workbrew, the NSS, or my thoughts on Gordon Lightfoot's 1976 masterpiece The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.