About Me
I'm a data engineer who loves building things that actually work. I'm drawn to data engineering because I love using my creativity to build efficient, maintainable, and scalable systems. Currently at Sub-Zero Group in Madison, WI, I spend my days building data pipelines with Snowflake, dbt, Terraform, and SQL; migrating legacy systems to modern cloud architecture and making sure the data teams can actually trust what they're seeing.
My Story
My path to data engineering has been anything but conventional. I spent nearly a decade in HR, working my way from benefits representative at Target to HRIS analyst at Ameriprise Financial, where I managed PeopleSoft modules, handled TOAD for Oracle, and was a subject matter expert during a PeopleSoft to Workday implementation. I learned to manage without authority, keeping projects on track by coordinating between developers and business users, gathering requirements, and making sure everyone stayed aligned. I was good at it. I worked with enterprise systems, solved complex problems, and even won a "Melonhead" award from the CEO for keeping things running during layoffs. But something was missing.
I realized what I really wanted was to use my creativity to design and build systems from the ground up, not just maintain what someone else had created. I wanted to architect solutions, make design decisions, and build something that was both elegant and functional. So in 2017, I did something that seemed crazy to most people: I walked away from a stable career and moved to China to get my bachelor's degree in pursuit of a career transition. It was a goal I'd been thinking about for years, and I finally committed to it.
I spent five years in China, split between Suzhou and Beijing. I was accepted into the information systems program at Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University, but switched to international business and Chinese language the week before classes started. It was probably my only real chance to learn Chinese, and I wasn't going to waste it. Mandarin didn't come easy. I crammed eight semesters into six and barely passed HSK3, but I finished my bachelor's in three years. Then came two more years getting my master's in Computer Information Systems from Boston University, this time from my apartment in Beijing during Covid. It wasn't just about the degrees; it was about proving I could change direction completely and pursue what I actually wanted.
Since graduating in 2022, I've been working as a data engineer. I started at UnitedHealth Group in their Technology Development Rotation Program, where I migrated legacy DataStage/Teradata pipelines to Snowflake, built performance optimization frameworks, and learned what it takes to handle HIPAA-compliant data at scale. Now at Sub-Zero Group, I'm building the data infrastructure that supports their SAP migration and analytics needs.
What I Actually Do
Data Platforms
- • Snowflake (my daily driver)
- • dbt for transformations
- • Azure Data Factory
- • Fivetran for ingestion
- • Terraform for IaC
- • Monte Carlo for monitoring
Languages & Tools
- • SQL (lots of SQL)
- • Python (Snowpark, Pandas)
- • Git & Azure DevOps
- • Bash scripting
- • Power BI
- • R (for fun)
What I Focus On
- • Building reliable pipelines
- • Data modeling (star schema)
- • Performance optimization
- • Data quality & governance
- • Making things faster & cheaper
- • Actually documenting stuff
Work History
Sub-Zero Group
Associate Data Engineer • Madison, WI • July 2024 - Present
Building data pipelines for their ERP migration from Infor XA to SAP. Working with dbt, Fivetran, Snowflake, and Terraform to create the infrastructure that'll support their analytics for years to come.
UnitedHealth Group (Optum)
Data Engineer • Austin, TX • July 2022 - July 2024
Got into their competitive engineering rotation program. Spent two years migrating legacy pipelines to Snowflake, building automation frameworks that cut compute costs by 38%, and implementing security patterns for HIPAA compliance. Learned what it takes to work with healthcare data at scale.
Ameriprise Financial
Senior HRIS Analyst • Minneapolis, MN • 2015 - 2017
Where I learned how enterprise systems actually work. Managed PeopleSoft integrations, handled security, ran UAT cycles, and gathered requirements. This is where I first realized I wanted to work more directly with data.
Education
Master of Science, Computer Information Systems
Boston University • 2022
Specialized in Business Intelligence & Database Management
Bachelor of Arts, International Business & Chinese Language
Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University • Suzhou, China • 2020
University of Liverpool degree, taught in English, in China. It was an experience.
Outside of Work
When I'm not writing SQL, I play guitar, roast my own coffee, bike around Madison, and tinker with side projects. I'm also trying to keep up my Mandarin (with mixed success), though it's definitely gotten rusty since leaving China.
Guitar
Coffee Roasting
Biking
What I'm looking for: I want to work on data infrastructure that actually matters, whether that's improving healthcare systems, making financial services more accessible, or helping companies make better decisions. I care about writing code that's maintainable, building systems that are reliable, and working with people who care about doing good work.