John Sheaffer Email & Phone Number

San Jose, Ca, Us

New York, Ny, Us

Supporting the US West sales team as a pre-sales engineer and Solution Architect. Joined at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, and helped sales rapidly acquire marquee logos in an uncertain work environment, and with an evolving cloud product and business model. As an expert in CockroachDB and customer advocate, I helped customers learn about CockroachDB and adapt SQL workloads to be scalable, resilient, geo-distributed, and fully consistent, while focusing of app development simplicity and time to market.Focus areas:- Translating distributed database theory into practical applications- Deployments on Cockroach Cloud, on-prem, in K8s, Docker, AWS, and GCP- Performance diagnostics and optimization- Specifically with high-throughput/low-latency applications- High availability, disaster recovery, and operational best practices- SQL-based application design, and optimizationAs a member of the initial pre-sales team:- Work closely with Product and Engineering to translate customer needs into product improvements- Mentor and train junior SEs and AEs on RDBMS concepts, diagnosis, and pre-sales methods- File product defect reports, feature requests, and documentation improvements- Document customer PoCs to capture issues encountered, lessons learned, and areas for improvement- Lead sales engineer working closely with major tech customers and prospects including: Apple, Netflix, Twitter, Disney, Roblox, Tesla, SpaceX, Cisco, Adobe, AMEX, AirBnB, Electronic Arts, HP, Intel, Nike, Sirius/Pandora, Pinterest, Samsung, and TwilioRecognition and Achievements:- FY23 Sales Engineer of the Year- FY22 Sales Engineer of the Year- FY22-Q3 Sales "Spartan" Award- FY21-Q4 Sales "Spartan" Award- Lead SE on the first large CockroachCloud sale, and its two record-breaking expansions- Lead SE on 3 consecutive record-breaking enterprise sales with major technology brand names- Regularly requested by-name by customers to assist in resolving complicated post-sales issues

San Mateo, California, Us

I worked closely with Ople prospects and customers in problem formulation, data selection, data preparation, and ML model interpretation. I employed a variety of data science tools, including Python, Pandas, Jupyter, Scikit-Learn, and the Ople.ai Platform.Reporting to the COO as a member of the Ople executive team, I was responsible globally for leading all technical sales efforts, collaborating closely with Product and Engineering on direction/features/improvements, advising Marketing on target personas, and supporting the strategic customers in a post-sales capacity.Immediately upon joining, worked to establish the product/market fit- Identified, defined, and evangelized the ideal customer profile (ICP) and target user & buyer personas- Developed a re-usable demo library that the sales reps can deliver themselves- Documented use case patterns for use in sales & marketing efforts- Gathered prospect use cases for use in product/engineering roadmap planning- Lead a differentiation strategy workshop with the CEO and executive team to identify Ople's Unique Selling PropositionsAdditionally took on the Sales Operations role:- Migrated the sales CRM (Copper) to Salesforce after week two- Customized Salesforce to suit the COO’s and VP of Marketing’s needs- Managed Salesforce data ownership, security, customizations & integrations, and backups- Worked with the VP of Marketing to implement/integrate Pardot and Discover.org into SalesforceCollaborated closely with the CPO, CTO, and VP of Engineering on product roadmap, improvements, priorities, customer requirements & usage patterns, GA release schedule & readinessAbout Ople:Leverage artificial intelligence across your organization. Ople makes AI available to every employee in every aspect of your business. Our software models the behavior, experience and intuition of elite data scientists and delivers production-grade AI models in as little as minutes, already deployed and ready to make predictions.

San Francisco, Ca, Us

Joined the Databricks Field Engineering team supporting the West region’s velocity territory as a Technical Solution Architect. Our mission: to rapidly acquire new customers by delivering deep technical expertise in Big Data and Machine Learning to solve real customer business problems.Assisted customers in deploying Data Engineering and Machine Learning pipelines into production using Apache Spark, Delta Lake, Docker, Python, Scikit-Learn, MLlib, MLflow, Hyperopt, and AWS.My focus areas at Databricks were:- Rapid deployment of the Databricks Unified Platform- Deploying data engineering pipelines using Apache Spark in production - Deploying distributed machine learning using Apache Spark- AWS deployments and security customizations- Customer enablement and growth- Business value-driven solution architectures

Redwood City, California, Us

Joined MariaDB through the Clustrix acquisition.Served as the Director of the North America Sales Engineering & Professional Services teams, reporting to the VP of Customer Success, while helping MariaDB integrate the ClustrixDB acquisition and enabling the MariaDB sales force to sell ClustrixDB.Products covered by our team:- MariaDB Server (Leading Open Source RDBMs)- MariaDB ColumnStore (Analytic Database)- MaxScale (Database proxy, scalability, replication, security, & HA solution)- ClustrixDB (Scale-out High-OLTP clustered database)Accomplishments:- Hired two top-notch team members within two months of taking over the team- Established clear processes around PS quoting and SOW creation/approval- Clarified SE engagement guidelines between Field Sales, Inside Sales, and Sales Development- Conducted sales enablement sessions for the MariaDB team on ClustrixDB selling topics including: opportunity prospecting, discovery, and qualification; PoC planning and execution, and deal sizing and discounting techniques

Redwood City, California, Us

Clustrix Inc. was acquired by MariaDB Corporation in Sep 2018.Hired by the CEO as the sole Sales Engineer, and rapidly assessed and re-defined the technical sales processes at Clustrix.Hired and trained the SE team on:- ClustrixDB product concepts and competitors- Technical positioning, discovery and objection handling- POC project planning (what to do, and what to avoid)- Working with Engineering (requirements, bug filing, reporting POC status)- Communication best practices with customers & internal organizationsAccomplishments:- Built an SE ramp-up curriculum to accelerate SE training & productivity- Built and delivered the official ClustrixDB Basic, and Advanced DBA training- Defined and managed a consistent POC entry, execution, and exit process- Tracked POCs by stage & risk level to provide visibility for the executive team- Developed scripts to help in POCs, product installation, and support diagnostics- Developed official configurations on Amazon AWS and Google Cloud- Defined and published the ClustrixDB Reference Architecture- Created videos as self-service sales & marketing assets- Created customer-facing installation and configuration documents- Performed the role of Technical Account Manager for strategic customersParticipated heavily in the acquisition of Clustrix by MariaDB. Took ownership of multiple areas during the initial weeks of merging the companies.Clustrix Employee Spotlight:https://goo.gl/YJwdgV

Hired by the CEO & CTO as the first Sales Engineer/Director, and to build out & lead the technical sales team. Additionally took ownership of critical areas in Product Management, Sales leadership, and general business operations which resulted in my promotion to Vice President.Accomplishments:- Identified the ideal customer profile (ICP) given the product’s strengths- Re-focused the positioning and sales approach to resonate with the ICP- Took ownership & refined pricing based on observations in early sales cycles- Lead the development of Tutorial Videos used in all phases of customer engagement- Wrote integration connectors & scripts in: Java, Ruby, Python, and Bash- Taught junior SEs, engineering, and support members SQL techniques for re-writing analytic SQL for primitive platforms- Designed & filed as the lead inventor a patent on a key new product capability- Designed the approach for native integration with Tableau Server- Worked with Engineering to standardize product enhancements, bug reporting and feedback to Engineering from the field- Developed an SE ramp-up curriculum to help new SEs quickly become self-sufficient- Trained the sales force on discovery techniques, opportunity qualification, POC scoping, & SFDC tracking- Jumpstarted, administered & evangelized the systematic adoption of Salesforce.com for forecasting & deal management- Defined formal stages & terminology for POC status tracking & reporting- Defined SE resource usage metrics for tracking and opportunity reporting- Co-presented with CEO & CFO representing Sales in Series-B investor pitches and due-diligence

San Mateo, Ca, Us

Hired by the CEO as the 1st Sales Engineer/Director to bootstrap, build & lead the Sales Engineering team.Most Proud of:* Hired an awesome SE team, and made their success my top priority* Secured the first 10 paying customers within 6 months of initial product GA- - Including first 2 pre-GA super-reference customers- - The 1st East Coast, Fin Svcs, $1M+ deal* Initial customers included:- - Edmunds.com, Riot Games, Citigroup, Washington Post, Netflix, Disney, DIRECTV, HP, US Gov't* Worked with Product Management to define many product enhancements based on customer use cases and feedback- - Including 2 major game-changing features added to the 3.0 release- - Usability enhancements determined from working side-by-side with customersOther Accomplishments:* Filled all 4 sales regions with hand-picked all-star SEs within 90 days of joining* Formalized and published the Sales POC Process* Instituted coordination & feedback processes between SE, Product, Marketing, & Engineering* Formalized the standard product presentation & demo* Defined and published a standard Reference Architecture for product installation* Built a SE technical ramp-up curriculum - adopted by Engineering & Support* Drove customer-derived product enhancements and roadmap- - Collected and articulated key product gaps & feature requests- - Translated customer & field feedback to product management- - Aggressively filed bugs & RFEs to help Engineering evolve the product- - Worked directly with the engineers to help them understand the customer mindset behind the RFEs* Jumpstarted the Salesforce.com implementation - - Tracking Accounts, Contacts, & Opportunities- - Report on the Pipeline & Sales Forecast- - Worked with the CFO & Sales VP to customize to match their forecasting needs

Brought in by the VP of Worldwide Sales & Channels to build a scalable technical selling team, and advise the company on a product strategy designed to target large enterprise accounts.Accomplishments:- Strategized, and planned the sales approach & methodology with the VP WW Sales & Channels- Advised Engineering on the critical feature set necessary for adoption in Enterprise Accounts- Lead the Solution Architect team consisting of aspiring Data Scientists- Instituted a formal POC status reporting framework: standard terminology, condition/status labeling, & regular stakeholder status meetings- Co-developed self-service product videos to accelerate end-user adoption- Created a compelling demo using an easy to follow and engaging story- Created industry-specific themed versions of the product demo- Published the standard Reference Architecture for product installation- Wrote user-friendly installation scripts to accelerate evaluations

Supported all ParAccel organizations as a Consulting Engineer in a strategic role through the creation of materials, tools, knowledge reuse, training, white papers, demos, and internal & external processes. Reported to the ParAccel Worldwide Sales management team. Managed the technical relationships with ParAccel's Strategic Partners. Facilitated collaboration between Sales, Marketing, Support, and Engineering to streamline revenue-generating operations and influence the product road map.Technical Lead for ParAccel's Strategic Relationship with MicroStrategy, including:* Social Intelligence* Cloud IntelligenceTechnical Lead for ParAccel's Strategic Hardware Vendor Partnerships (Dell, Cisco, etc):- Built vendor-owned Reference Architectures for ParAccelAccomplishments:* Built a company-wide knowledge portal to capture, organize and publish tribal knowledge for rapid reference, reuse and greater process scalability* Scripted the initial product install process for field techs, and participated in the reqs & testing of the new automated installer* Prototyped & documented key product manageability enhancements, then worked with Engineering & Support to integrate these capabilities into the mainline product* Established customer-facing & field re-usable Reference Hardware Configurations, to standardize hardware selection in both pre- and post-sales deployments, as well as ensure a consistent and high level of platform performance and stability in fast-paced Proof of Concepts* Produced sales calculators for field personnel (SE, PS, & Customer Support) to provide more accurate & immediate estimations during PoC & deployment planning* Formalized and published the Sales PoC Process and created deliverable templates to increase the professional "look & feel" as well as to minimize SE effort creating the deliverables* Collaborated with Marketing to rev the corporate positioning: from the high-level messages down to the technical presentations

Member of the technical pre-sales engineering team at Aster Data.* Presented the Aster Data nCluster technical architecture to prospects, focusing on Advanced Analytics* Executed prospect/customer PoCs including the installation, configuration, and tuning of nCluster hardware & software* Diagnosed and resolved performance issues in customer PoCs* Produced re-usable Field Engineering documentation to improve SE effectiveness and increase customer satisfaction in the technical pre-sales engagements

Austin, Texas, Us

Oracle Grid Platform product specialist. Functioned as a field sales consultant supporting the nationwide sales organization.* Educated customers on Grid Computing best practices, architectures, and software development techniques* Assisted customers in evaluating and deploying Oracle technology* Trained Sales Consultants and Sales Account Managers on an ever-expanding collection of products* Produced technical presentations, demonstrations, and supporting code and documentation in support of sales efforts* Mentored junior Sales Consultants on technology theory, sales practice, and career development* Built and maintained internal knowledge management sites designed to accelerate team efficiency* Worked closely with Oracle Development to provide market feedback, identify & resolve product usability and stability issues, and evangelize new product capability to the field sales organization

Austin, Texas, Us

Oracle Consulting Services (OCS) Oracle Advanced Programs Group (APG)* Oracle database technology implementation consultant & DBA* Specialized in Very-Large DBs, Oracle RAC, and High-Performance Oracle database implementation.* J2EE and core Java developer* Project lead and senior consultant responsible for training & mentoring junior consultants* Supported the US Intelligence community - maintained the required security clearances

Randolph Afb, Tx, Us

Active duty. Separated at the rank of Captain (O-3).Primary Duty Assignment:Peacekeeper ICBM Combat Crew CommanderAdditional Duty Assignments:* Operations Crew Training Instructor* Computer-based Training (CBT) developer* Unit Computer Security Officer

M.S., Computer Science

Basic Officer Training & Commissioning

B.S., Aviation Technology W/ Minor In Computer Science

A.S., Avionics Engineering Technology