• 👋 Hi, I'm @ephbaum
  • I'm Eph Baum — just a human doing their best in the beautiful Pacific Northwest
  • My current employer is Cars Commerce — see more experience
• 👀 I'm interested in:
  • outside
  • travel & adventure
  • making things
  • learning stuff
  • history
  • storytelling — in all its forms
  • play
  • and much, much more
• 📋 What I do:
  • write code for money
  • help other people write code (usually for money)
  • tell stories (writing, photography, games, whatever works)
  • hike & travel
  • play video games
  • and much, much more (too much, probably)
• 🌱 I'm (eternally) learning:
  • new ways to take care of myself and others
  • history, particularly of where I live
  • new technologies and old
  • literally whatever interests me in the moment
• 🤝 I'm always looking to collaborate on:
  • anything related to the above
  • anything that could make the world a better place for us all
  • anything deeply enriching
  • find me Bombing Around
  • hite me at Outsider Solutions
• 📫 How to reach me:
  • GitHub
  • 🖇️ LinkedIn
  • 🐘 Mastodon
  • 🐦 Xitter
  • 📷 Instagram
  • 📑 Dev Blog
  • 🔖 Personal Blog
  • and so many more... seriously, I'm not hard to find. Many others have reached out — will you?

Welcome

Welcome to my GitHub Profile. If you're reading this, I'd love to know!

Serioously, let me know that you've actually read my README.md right here on GitHub.com 😅🤙

Also, if you're feeling at all generous, feel free to tip me or buy me a kombucha or something

📜 Résumé / Experience

🧑‍💻 Summary

I'm a Senior Software Engineer with decades of experience spanning startups and enterprise-scale platforms.
At Cars Commerce, I help power the Cars.com marketplace by maintaining and evolving core Elixir/Phoenix applications deployed on Kubernetes (EKS), leveraging Docker, PostgreSQL, GraphQL, and modern DevOps practices to ensure reliability and scalability.

I’ve led as both an engineer and a mentor, cultivating environments rooted in psychological safety, radical transparency, and servant leadership.
Whether solving complex distributed systems challenges, guiding platform modernization, or mentoring engineers, I blend technical rigor with human-centered leadership.

💼 Experience

Cars Commerce

Senior Software Engineer
Apr 2022 – Present | Chicago, IL (Remote)

• Maintain and evolve Elixir/Phoenix services powering Cars.com’s core marketplace.
• Improve CI/CD pipelines, monitoring, and incident response for greater operational excellence.
• Provide technical oversight of the FUEL advertising platform as it sunsets into Marketplace Media.
• Mentor engineers and facilitate agile ceremonies to foster collaboration and growth.

Engineering Manager
Nov 2020 – Apr 2022 | Chicago, IL (Remote)

• Managed 6–9 engineers across multiple teams in Dealer Inspire’s CORE group.
• Oversaw delivery of legacy systems while driving modernization initiatives.
• Fostered a culture of growth and psychological safety through servant leadership.

Dealer Inspire

Sr. Software Engineer
Sep 2017 – Nov 2020 | Naperville, IL (Remote)

• Built and maintained APIs supporting a large portfolio of sites and WordPress plugins.
• Modernized infrastructure, driving the shift from Vagrant to Docker.
• Collaborated with SysOps to improve security and performance.
• Tech: PHP, Laravel, JavaScript, TypeScript, MySQL, Redis, Docker, AWS.

MTS Systems Corporation

Software Engineer – Full Stack / Mobile Team Lead
Mar 2013 – Apr 2016 | Eden Prairie, MN

• Led a team of 2–4 engineers building hybrid mobile apps (Cordova, Angular, Ionic).
• Awarded a global patent for mobile application UI technology.
• Designed and implemented APIs and backend services in PHP (Laravel), Node.js, MySQL/NoSQL.
• Championed modern practices, improving delivery speed and code quality.

Freelance & Consulting Engineer

Independent Consultant
Oct 1999 – Present | Various Clients

• Founded and operated Clocktower Computers and dogInFlight, delivering custom web, IT, and application solutions.
• Built APIs and web applications using PHP, Laravel, Node.js, React, Ruby on Rails, and Ionic.
• Migrated legacy systems to modern stacks with Docker and AWS.
• Delivered hybrid mobile apps and cross‑platform solutions (JavaScript, TypeScript, Angular, Ionic).
• Supported agencies and enterprises (e.g., The Lacek Group, Sigient, Chanl Health, Robert Half) with modernization projects.
• Mentored junior developers and introduced DevOps practices to improve delivery pipelines.

🛠️ Skills

• Languages & Frameworks: Elixir, Phoenix, PHP, Laravel, React.js, Node.js, GraphQL
• DevOps & Infrastructure: Kubernetes (EKS), Docker, AWS, CI/CD, Monitoring
• Databases: PostgreSQL, MySQL, Redis
• Leadership & Culture: Servant Leadership, Psychological Safety, Mentorship

🏆 Honors & Awards

• 2021 CARSYs Technology Functional Award – Software Engineering Excellence
• Business Value Award – Hackathon Ep. IX
• Creativity Award – Hackathon Ep. IV
• Top Internal Award – Hackathon Ep. VII
• Learning Tenet Award Nominee

📜 Patent

Mobile Application Interactive User Interface for a Remote Computing Device Monitoring a Test Device
(Global patent awarded for hybrid mobile UI innovation) *