Charles Reed

Staff full-stack engineer with 12+ years of experience building cloud products across commerce, insurance, workforce technology, and digital media. Specializes in React, Node.js, TypeScript, and AWS, connecting microservices, AI-powered experiences, front-end architecture, and delivery automation to improve customer engagement and operating efficiency.

Senior Software Engineer - Maximus Contract - Tysons, VA

(2024-08)

• Led the shift from a Node.js and TypeScript monolith to independently deployable Products, Link, AI, and Ads microservices connected through internal REST APIs, improving scalability and team autonomy.
• Architected an AWS serverless platform with Lambda, API Gateway, DynamoDB, S3, SQS, and AWS CDK, making environments repeatable through Infrastructure as Code.
• Designed REST APIs around AI models that generated context-aware ads, images, articles, and page sections across five embed types, expanding reusable publisher experiences.
• Led a client-facing AI-powered content-to-commerce platform from concept to production across 10+ publisher sites, reaching 150K+ daily impressions at a 0.5% CTR.
• Built React and TypeScript embeds hosted on S3 and CloudFront, letting publishers add dynamic commerce content without custom page rewrites and cutting integration effort.
• Used SQS to decouple AI-generation and delivery workflows, protecting API responsiveness and stabilizing high-volume publishing jobs.
• Automated Jest and Playwright checks, packaging, promotion, and rollback in GitHub Actions, cutting average deployment time by 35%.
• Added CloudWatch dashboards, Sentry alerts, and structured Node.js logs, helping engineers isolate failures quickly and limit disruption across publisher sites.
• Tuned Lambda execution, DynamoDB access patterns, S3 usage, and CloudFront delivery, lowering monthly AWS spend by 18% without compromising responsiveness.
• Applied AWS IAM, least-privilege access, managed secrets, input validation, and dependency scanning, reducing late-stage security findings and release delays.
• Mentored engineers through microservice boundaries, AWS CDK reviews, and incident follow-up while targeted automation saved about eight hours per sprint.

Staff Software Engineer - Spot Insurance Contract - Austin, TX

(2023-07 - 2024-08)

• Led development of responsive React 18 dashboards for insurance workflows, giving users clearer access to operational and customer data across desktop and mobile layouts.
• Modernized legacy Create React App applications by migrating to Vite and TypeScript, improving build speed, maintainability, and developer feedback cycles.
• Improved Core Web Vitals by 60% on the primary landing page through code splitting, React Suspense, and lazy loading, creating a faster customer entry experience.
• Integrated REST APIs with TanStack Query, standardizing caching, request state, and error handling for dependable dashboard data.
• Built reusable React 18 components and responsive HTML5/CSS3 layouts, reducing duplication and keeping insurance workflows visually consistent.
• Used feature flags and Sentry to stage front-end releases and detect client-side failures, reducing risk to active insurance users.
• Expanded Jest, React Testing Library, and Playwright coverage, reducing escaped defects in critical insurance workflows by 26%.
• Drove TypeScript, React, accessibility, and performance standards across product, design, and backend teams, reducing UI rework and delivery friction.
• Resolved Vite build and GitHub Actions failures, reducing release rework and improving front-end delivery reliability.

Senior Developer - Shopify Contract - Remote | USA

(2022-01 - 2023-07)

• Shipped a cross-platform commerce platform with React Native and Next.js, using React Native Web and Solito to reduce duplicate work and accelerate web/mobile feature parity.
• Built mobile interactions with Reanimated and responsive Next.js experiences, delivering consistent customer journeys while preserving platform-specific behavior.
• Integrated Apollo GraphQL and Auth0 for authenticated customer data flows, providing consistent sessions and dependable commerce data access across web and mobile.
• Created shared components and documented them in Storybook, shortening interface review cycles and reducing rework between engineering and product partners.
• Implemented Detox and Playwright coverage in GitHub Actions, reducing cross-platform release risk and improving confidence in customer-critical journeys.

Staff Software Engineer - Workrise Contract - Austin, TX

(2020-10 - 2021-12)

• Guided React Native, Node.js, GraphQL, and PostgreSQL delivery for worker onboarding and marketplace workflows, helping users move through core tasks with less friction.
• Separated Node.js capabilities behind clear GraphQL contracts, enabling faster product changes without coordinating the entire marketplace as one release.
• Improved PostgreSQL access patterns after reviewing slow marketplace workflows, reducing response delays in high-use worker and staffing experiences.
• Automated Docker builds, Jest checks, and deployments with GitHub Actions and Pulumi, reducing release-cycle time by 34% and giving distributed teams a consistent process.
• Led TypeScript reviews, Sentry-based incident follow-up, and production-readiness discussions, reducing repeat issues and improving marketplace reliability after launch.

Software Engineer | Senior Software Engineer - RetailMeNot, Inc. - Austin, TX

(2013-01 - 2020-10)

• Progressed through five engineering levels while building React, Node.js, SQL, and AWS products that supported offer discovery and advertiser campaigns, resulting in faster offer discovery for users.
• Created reusable React patterns and shared build conventions, helping product teams deliver consumer experiences faster with fewer release differences.
• Delivered Node.js REST integrations and PostgreSQL services for high-traffic offer and merchant experiences, improving the reliability of data moving into production.
• Improved release quality with Jest, Docker, CI/CD automation, Sentry monitoring, and incremental safeguards, reducing deployment-related defects by 27% across web and mobile products.
• Mentored engineers, reviewed JavaScript and TypeScript changes, and led production follow-up, scaling consistent engineering quality across product teams.

Bachelor of Science - Computer Science - The University of Texas at Austin (2014)