# Don McCaughey - don@donm.cc - +1 (415) 793-1166 I'm a software engineer with strong technical, leadership and organizational skills. I build high performing, collaborative, cross-functional teams that focus on sustained, predictable delivery of value to customers. ## Rat Cat Dog Software 2025 to present Founder and Software Quality Expert I help organizations level up their software quality game. We can produce code faster than ever; verifying that our code works as intended is critical. - I use technical metrics and interviews to find gaps and pain points. - I build action plans that increase coordination and reduce friction between engineering, product, QA, customer success and go-to-market functions. - I implement foundational quality and developer productivity systems. - I coach leaders, software engineers and quality assurance specialists on ways to build quality into every step of the software production system. ## United States Digital Service 2023 to 2025 Digital Services Expert USDS helped agencies across the federal government build and improve their software systems, delivering a better government experience to millions of people. At USDS I was detailed to the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Office of the CTO (OCTO), where I was the mobile engineering lead responsible for the [VA: Health and Benefits mobile app][1]. - Engineering leader for a thirty person mobile development team. - Shipped a high quality release every two weeks used by over one million veterans monthly. - Worked closely with health, benefits and digital experience teams to ship new mobile features. - Helped develop and run a lightweight engineering review for fifty contract teams building on VA.gov, spotting problems or omissions in 75% of projects. [1]: https://mobile.va.gov/app/va-health-and-benefits ## Cruise 2022 to 2023 Staff Software Engineer I worked on cloud services for managing Cruise's fleet of autonomous vehicles. - Drove efforts to improve engineering culture and standards. - On-boarded and mentored new engineers as the team doubled in size. - Helped get a complex cross-functional integration effort back on track. ## Truework 2019 to 2021 Engineering Manager I was the first engineering manager at this early stage fintech startup. - Established a fast and lightweight weekly planning and delivery cycle that increased engineering velocity and predictability. - Doubled the team to 15 engineers, hiring across all experience levels. - Guided delivery of public SDKs, SSO, internal tools and partner integrations. ## Copper CRM 2016 to 2019 Principal Software Engineer --> Engineering Manager --> Sr Engineering Manager I lead the mobile and infrastructure teams at Copper - Established a regular release cadence and shipped many new features. - Grew mobile team from two to six engineers and fostered a collaborative, cross-functional team culture. - Quadrupled web app release rate by improving the release process. ## Able Pear Software 2008 to 2016 Founder and Principal Developer I ran a small software development firm. Interesting projects included: - **Square**, 2012 - _iPad integration with point-of-sale (POS) hardware_ Built an iOS library linking the Square POS app with the Square Stand. Worked with the app team and embedded software team to create APIs and communication protocols. Built engineering test applications. - **Facebook, Skype, Pivotal Labs**, 2011 - _Skype app for unreleased phone_ Created a Skype client for a mobile OS built on an Android core. Worked with Skype and Facebook engineers to integrate the Skype client library with the phone's custom UI toolkit built atop HTML, CSS and JavaScript. - **BMW**, 2009-2010 - _first iPhone integration for the [BMW Mini][2]_ Designed and implemented a unique proxy to direct HTTP connections from the app to the automotive head unit. Worked with embedded engineers to design a communication protocol. Diagnosed and fixed intermittent data corruption. [2]: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/id1519458349 ## Education - **Stanford University** - One year of graduate study in mechanical engineering; focus in smart product design (ME 218). - **New Jersey Institute of Technology** - BS, Mechanical Engineering. https://donm.cc/maze/ start + ------+--------------+--------------+-----------------+--+ | | | | | | +-----+ +-----+ ---+ +--+ +-----+ | +------ +--- | | | | | | | | | | | | | | +--- | | | +--+ +--+ | | | +-----+ ---+--+ +--+ | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | ---+-----+--+ | | | +--+--+ | | +--+ | +--+--+ | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | +--- | | | | | +--- | | | +--- | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | ---+--+--+-----+ | ---+-----+--+--+--+ +-----+ | | | | | | | | | | | +--+------ | | ------+--------+ | | | +--+--+ +--+ | | | | | | | | | | | | ---+--- | +-----+--+ ------+-----+ | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | +-----+------ | +--+--------- +-----+ +-----+ | | | | | | | | | | | +-----+-----------+--+ | +-----+-----------+ ---+ | | | | | | | | | | +-----+ +--+--- +--+ | | | | +-----------+-----+--+ | | | | | | | | | | | | | | ---+--- | +--+ | | +-----+ | ------+ | | | ---+ | | | | | | +--------------+-----------------+-----------+-----+------ + finish updated 21 February 2026