Hi, I'm Jeff Sims
I am a self-taught, remote JavaScript developer currently living in Ann Arbor, MI. I started to enjoy writing code after I graduated college. My first job involved a lot of SQL for data analysis and database marketing. I loved the thrill of constructing the perfect query or the anxiety of updating data in bulk (don't forget the where clause!).
In 2011, I started working for the Detroit Red Wings as their CRM and Analytics Manager. During the course of my job I was able to utilize JavaScript to customize the front-end of Microsoft Dynamics and Qualtrics survery tool. I was hooked! I started reading everything I could and began developing personal web applications. One such app was a found change tracker: my wife and I loved walking around Detroit and seeing who could find the most change. I built an app that had a form to put in how much change and the app would grab your location when you submit the form and the data would get displayed on a map.
After 2 years at the Wings, my dream job at the Detroit Lions opened up. It was a similar role with greater responsibility. I jumped at the chance to take it. While there, I was able to work on several interesting projects and continue to grow as a developer. I was very lucky in that the VP of Technology was extremely encouraging and would give me development projects to work on for him. One project was a personalized URL for all of the Detroit Lions Season Ticket Holders. Each season ticket holder would get their URL and the page would display their invoice for renewing season tickets, along with information on their benefits, who their account rep was, among other things. I developed the project from scratch, on my own, using the Foundation framework on the frontend and Node.js on the backend. I stored the data in a mongo database and deployed the app to Heroku. Not bad for a self-taught developer!
My coding itch was not going away and ultimately I decided to leave the Detroit Lions so I could pursue becoming an engineer full-time. I was able to join StoneTimberRiver, who I had worked with when I was with the Red Wings. While there, I redeveloped one of the core products to manage sponsorship inventory, developed a tool for our clients to manage campaigns in bulk and was the lead developer on our latest product, Discovery. Discovery is a custom frontend for Microsoft Dynamics or Salesforce originally written in Angularjs and currently being ported to React. The server is written in Nodejs and hits either the Dynamics or Salesforce api and then serializes and standardizes the data before returning it to the frontend. In August 2018, StoneTimberRiver was bought by SSB. I'm still employed by SSB and was recently promoted to Senior Software Engineer.
When I'm not busy with my day job or hacking on a personal project, I'm probably chasing my young daughter around or hiking with her and my wife. I've lived in Detroit, MI, Boulder, CO, Grand Lake, CO and Ann Arbor, MI. Currently trying to figure out a way back to Colorado!