Hello there! I’m Helen Beal, a new CD Foundation Ambassador from Chichester in the UK. I’m also Chief Ambassador at DevOps Institute so you can tell I’m a huge fan of the power of community. I’m also a DevOps coach, writer and speaker and strategic advisor. Books and words are a huge part of my life – I read constantly and have also written several novels with more in the pipeline. I also love playing Scrabble and Bananagrams.
This is me at home in Chichester, in the beautiful Priory Park. Behind me is the priory where William Blake was tried for sedition in 1803.
I’m really excited to have this opportunity to work closely with the Continuous Delivery community as it’s such an integral part of what we do in DevOps and I’ve been working with the software development lifecycle for my whole career, starting with Lotus Notes (remember that?!) in 1995! I write and speak about many different aspects of DevOps – recently I’ve been really focused on neuroscience in the workplace and value stream management. I also just did my first talk on the relationship between community and capitalism for TechStrongCon. Here’s a beautiful visual rendition of a recent talk by the wonderful MindsEyeCCF.
When I’m not DevOpsing, I tend to be out enjoying the beautiful British countryside. I’m a volunteer warden at a local nature reserve, Kingley Vale, where I pick up litter, ask people to put their dogs on leads and monitor species like the Chalk Hill Blue butterfly and one of our two UK snake species, the (lightly venomous) adder. Here’s me with a baby tawny owl.
I’m excited to be contributing to this community and meeting new people and learning new things. You can follow me on InfoQ here and Medium here. Find me on LinkedIn here and Twitter here.
