Lead Software Engineer

Hey, I’mRyan Jensen

I love the craft. I've spent 8+ years building, breaking, fixing, and shipping software across .NET, JVM, and JavaScript stacks, and I'm happiest untangling the hard problem, modernizing the legacy system nobody wants to touch, and bringing the rest of the team along with me.

From loading trucks to leading engineering teams, I’ve been shipping things since 2013.

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Based in: West Des Moines, IA
Work style: Open to on-site, hybrid, or remote
Authorization: US citizen; no sponsorship required
Experience: 8+ years in software, plus nearly 4 years supervising frontline teams

A few numbers I’m proud of

91%
lower monthly AWS costs at Patient Preferred, from ~$1,400 to ~$120
80%+
faster CI/CD builds at Principal Financial Group
#1
interviewer at Source Allies in 2025 and 2026, with 30+ interviews and ~10 hires
70+
drivers and warehouse staff supervised at UPS
450+
Hy-Vee grocery and convenience stores served by the Tax API

The route so far

Experience

Software Consultant
Source Allies
Dec 2024 – Present
Urbandale, IA
Consultant across 4+ client engagements in financial services, insurance, identity management, and enterprise web, spanning full-stack development, delivery leadership, coaching, and generative AI.
- Technical delivery lead for a data engineering engagement (SQL Server, Databricks, dbt), including project management and coaching.
- Led English/French internationalization of a client's customer portal and outgoing email (Vue I18n, Thymeleaf, Spring Boot).
- Bootstrapped a generative AI initiative on AWS Bedrock.
- Ranked #1 interviewer for 2025 and the first half of 2026, with 30+ interviews and ~10 hires still with the company.
- Mentor and teach the company's apprentices.
- Reworked the frontend of a high-traffic identity-management application.
Technologies
- Vue.js
- React
- Java
- Spring Boot
- GraphQL
- C#
- TypeScript
- Python
- Node.js
- AWS Bedrock
- Azure
- SQL Server
- Databricks
- dbt
Fractional CTO
Patient Preferred Financial Services
Nov 2021 – Present
Remote · Currently part-time, supporting new feature requests and regular software updates.
Took over a clinic payment and patient-management platform from a larger development team and run it solo, reporting to leadership. Own technology strategy, budget, vendor relationships (DataX, ACHeck, Web.com), and security and compliance.
- Cut monthly AWS costs ~91% (~$1,400 → ~$120) over three years while improving availability, stability, and speed.
- Modernized the platform from an AngularJS frontend, .NET Framework API, and SQL Server with SQL Jobs on Windows Server 2012 EC2 instances to SSR Next.js on AWS via OpenNext, modern .NET Minimal APIs on AWS Lambda, PostgreSQL on AWS RDS, and crontab on a nano Linux instance.
- Built resiliency and fallback plans into critical third-party integrations, including ACH payments.
Technologies
- .NET Framework 4.5 → .NET 10
- AngularJS → Next.js
- SQL Server → PostgreSQL
- EC2 → CloudFront + Lambda + OpenNext
- SQL Jobs → Linux (crontab)
- Terraform
Contract Senior Software Engineer
Principal Financial Group
Jun 2024 – Dec 2024
Des Moines, IA (Remote)
Modernized legacy .NET applications and the pipelines that ship them.
- Set up CI/CD in GitHub Actions and supported on-prem-to-AWS migrations using Lambda and SNS.
- Cut build times in existing pipelines by 80%+, tightening developer feedback loops.
Software Engineer 3
Wellabe, Inc.
Jul 2022 – Jun 2024
Des Moines, IA
Led small teams modernizing the company's software and unifying its tech stack.
- Migrated WPF desktop apps to Blazor web apps and improved the performance of legacy software.
- Reengineered CI/CD to increase developer throughput and added test-coverage requirements.
- Led the team that owned the company's main revenue-generating product, training and supporting every engineer on it.
- Mentored 7 junior and mid-level engineers and paired with each intern for their entire internship.
- Improved business-critical daily batch programs and built a department wiki to centralize documentation.
Contract Senior Software Developer
Far Reach Inc.
Mar 2022 – Jun 2022
Contract via Modis
Built full-stack features for a homegrown ERP system with Angular, RxJS, .NET, and SQL Server on Azure, using ASP.NET Boilerplate, PrimeNG, and Bootstrap.
Software Engineer
Hy-Vee, Inc.
Oct 2019 – Mar 2022
Worked across legacy .NET and WinForms applications and greenfield React, Kotlin, Spring Boot, Ktor, and GraphQL services, federated with Apollo on Google Cloud.
- Helped build a Tax API on a task force, managing product tax values for 450+ grocery and convenience stores and publishing updates to every store over pub/sub.
- Seeded new stores with millions of tax records in batches, with a check after each batch that every item was accounted for.
- Led the move of widely used shared libraries from a file share to GitHub, with CI/CD, artifact storage, and automated tests.
- Cut CI/CD build times by 50%+.
Software Developer
Stine Seed, Inc.
Apr 2019 – Oct 2019
Dallas Center, IA
Built features for employee portals that manage seed production, packaging, and sales (Angular, .NET Core), set up CI/CD in Azure DevOps, and kept a tight feedback loop with users.
Associate .NET Developer
Brownells, Inc.
Dec 2017 – Apr 2019
Grinnell, IA
Integrated a new third-party ERP with existing WMS and POS systems, building pub/sub message pathways and failover on IBM MQ, with a Razor Pages, jQuery, and Bootstrap frontend on .NET Framework APIs.

The honest inventory

I wasn’t kidding about the wild range of tech stacks. Select a skill to see where I’ve used it. marks a skill I’m proficient in.

Languages

C#Proficient
Used at:
- Source Allies
SQLProficient
Used at:
KotlinProficient
Used at:
- Hy-Vee, Inc.
Java
Used at:
- Source Allies
JavaScript
Ask me where I’ve used this.
TypeScript
Used at:
- Source Allies
Python
Used at:
- Source Allies
HTML
Ask me where I’ve used this.
CSS / Sass / Less
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Bash
Ask me where I’ve used this.
PowerShell
Ask me where I’ve used this.

Backend Frameworks

.NET (Core)Proficient
Used at:
.NET Framework
Used at:
- Patient Preferred Financial Services
- Brownells, Inc.
Spring / Spring Boot
Used at:
- Source Allies
- Hy-Vee, Inc.
GraphQL
Used at:
- Source Allies
- Hy-Vee, Inc.
Ktor
Used at:
- Hy-Vee, Inc.
Node.js
Used at:
- Source Allies
Express
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Apollo GraphQL
Ask me where I’ve used this.

Frontend Frameworks

BlazorProficient
Used at:
- Wellabe, Inc.
AngularProficient
Used at:
- Far Reach Inc.
- Stine Seed, Inc.
React / Next.js
Used at:
BootstrapProficient
Used at:
- Far Reach Inc.
- Brownells, Inc.
Tailwind
Ask me where I’ve used this.
WPF
Used at:
- Wellabe, Inc.
Vue.js
Used at:
- Source Allies
AngularJS
Used at:
- Patient Preferred Financial Services
jQuery
Used at:
- Brownells, Inc.
RxJS
Used at:
- Far Reach Inc.
HTMX
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Material UI
Ask me where I’ve used this.

DevOps / CI/CD

GitProficient
Ask me where I’ve used this.
GitHubProficient
Used at:
- Principal Financial Group
- Hy-Vee, Inc.
GitHub ActionsProficient
Used at:
- Principal Financial Group
Azure DevOpsProficient
Used at:
- Stine Seed, Inc.
Concourse CIProficient
Ask me where I’ve used this.
TerraformProficient
Used at:
- Patient Preferred Financial Services
Ansible
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Linux (cron)
Used at:
- Patient Preferred Financial Services

ORM

Entity Framework CoreProficient
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Spring Data JPA
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Dapper
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Exposed
Ask me where I’ve used this.

Containerization

DockerProficient
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Kubernetes
Ask me where I’ve used this.
NuGetProficient
Ask me where I’ve used this.
npm
Ask me where I’ve used this.

Data

SQL Server
Used at:
PostgreSQL
Used at:
- Patient Preferred Financial Services
MySQL
Ask me where I’ve used this.
SQLite
Ask me where I’ve used this.
MongoDB
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Redis
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Elasticsearch
Ask me where I’ve used this.

Build & Testing

Gradle
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Maven
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Yarn
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Webpack
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Cypress
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Selenium
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Gherkin
Ask me where I’ve used this.

Tooling

JetBrains IDEs
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Visual Studio / VS Code
Ask me where I’ve used this.
SSMS / SSIS
Ask me where I’ve used this.
dbt
Used at:
- Source Allies
Eclipse
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Postman
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Figma
Ask me where I’ve used this.

Cloud

AWSProficient
Used at:
AzureProficient
Used at:
Google Cloud
Used at:
- Hy-Vee, Inc.
EC2
Used at:
- Patient Preferred Financial Services
S3
Ask me where I’ve used this.
RDS
Used at:
- Patient Preferred Financial Services
CloudFront
Used at:
- Patient Preferred Financial Services
Lambda
Used at:
- Patient Preferred Financial Services
- Principal Financial Group
OpenNext
Used at:
- Patient Preferred Financial Services

Project Management

ScrumProficient
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Kanban
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Agile
Ask me where I’ve used this.
JiraProficient
Ask me where I’ve used this.
GitHub Projects
Ask me where I’ve used this.

Leadership

Hiring & interviewing
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Mentoring & coaching
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Technical delivery leadership
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Vendor management
Ask me where I’ve used this.
Technology strategy & budgeting
Ask me where I’ve used this.

Education & certifications

B.S. Computer Science
Trident University International · 2017
Computer Engineering coursework
Iowa State University, Ames, IA · 2013–2016
A.A. Liberal Arts
Marshalltown Community College, Marshalltown, IA · 2011–2013

AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
Amazon Web Services
Scrum Fundamentals Certified
SCRUMstudy · 2018

I’m not just a terminal and an IDE

Beyond the code

Husband & father
First and foremost, I'm a husband to the best, most beautiful, smart, and funny wife I could have met, and a father to a wonderful, spunky, and frightfully intelligent boy. When he's awake, I try to spend as much time as I can with him: watching him grow, feeding him strawberries, and playing piano together.
Gaming
I've always been a gamer. It's how I unwind, and honestly, it's part of what got me into software in the first place. Long RPG session or something competitive, I'm always down.
Anime
Yeah, I watch anime. My top 10 changes every season, though One Piece is almost always number one. If you want to talk about what's airing or debate subs vs. dubs, I'm your guy.
Home lab
I run my own home lab and love experimenting with infrastructure, self-hosting, and networking, and generally seeing how things work under the hood. If it has a config file, I'm going to mess with it.

Side projects

Marbles
A digital version of a board game invented by my mom's side of the family. It brings out the best (and worst) in everyone at family gatherings, and I'd wanted to put it on a screen for years. It's finally live and playable.
Play Marbles at marbls.co Source on GitHub

Take the resume with you

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Let’s connect.

I’m always open to interesting conversations, whether it’s a job opportunity, a collaboration, a cool open-source project, or just talking shop. If you’re hiring, send me the job description and a little about the team. I’ll get back to you quickly, and I’m happy to share my phone number once we’ve connected.