# Nick Hess

nick@nickhess.dev | [nickhess.dev](https://nickhess.dev) | [github.com/hessnd](https://github.com/hessnd) | [linkedin.com/in/hessnick](https://linkedin.com/in/hessnick)

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## Summary

Staff Engineering Leader with 11 years of experience architecting and delivering large-scale web platforms. Lead an 8-person engineering team owning Peloton's consumer-facing e-commerce experience at onepeloton.com and the web platform infrastructure serving 70+ engineers. Track record of expanding scope from internal platform engineering into public-facing product systems, defining technical direction across organizational boundaries, personally executing the highest-complexity initiatives, and measurably improving developer velocity and system reliability. Speaker at Next.js Conf 2024.

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## Experience

### Peloton Interactive

**Staff Tech Lead Manager, Discovery** | Jul 2024 -- Present

- Expanded team from 4 to 8 engineers, taking dual ownership of Peloton's consumer e-commerce experience (millions of monthly users) and the web platform infrastructure serving 70+ engineers across the organization.
- Cut deployment lead time by 50% by migrating 8 Next.js applications from Netlify to Vercel with custom orchestration, then building a full CI/CD pipeline (GitHub Actions, Vercel SDK, NX) used across ~55,000+ PRs in the monorepo.
- Decomposed a monolithic React application into independently deployable Next.js microfrontends using Vercel's split architecture, unlocking autonomous team releases and faster build times.
- Co-led migration from a GraphQL monolith to a federated architecture, eliminating schema-related production incidents and enabling safe, independent schema evolution across teams.
- Drove monorepo health initiatives -- circular dependency guardrails, barrel import rewriting, React 18.3 upgrade -- reducing build coupling and unblocking the org-wide pnpm migration.

**Senior Software Engineer** | Sep 2023 -- Jul 2024

- Reduced customer support ticket volume by 40% during peak seasons by building Self Service features for direct member order modifications.
- Led incremental migration from a client-side-only React app to Next.js with SSR, improving Core Web Vitals and SEO -- presented this work at Next.js Conf 2024.
- Modernized the release process to align with DORA metrics, achieving 50%+ faster deployment lead time and 10% improvement in pipeline reliability.

**Software Engineer** | May 2020 -- Sep 2023

- Shipped core e-commerce features across Peloton's consumer web platform (React, TypeScript, GraphQL), contributing to the shared design system and component library used by all e-commerce teams.
- Introduced ESLint configurations, automated testing patterns, and PR review workflows that became the org-wide standard for frontend code quality.

### LoftSmart

**Full Stack Engineer** | Apr 2019 -- Mar 2020

- Refactored a legacy multi-page application to a React SPA, improving time-to-interactive by 30%.
- Led TypeScript migration for the React frontend, reducing production bug rate by 80%.
- Developed an interactive rental preference quiz driving 10% conversion rate improvement across 5 university campuses.

### Big Spaceship

**Senior Technologist** | Feb 2019 -- Apr 2019
**Technologist** | Jan 2017 -- Feb 2019
**Junior Technologist** | Jul 2015 -- Jan 2017

- Delivered bespoke web experiences for Starbucks, Compass, and other premium clients, handling high-traffic launches and complex interactive requirements.
- Established engineering standards including automated testing, CI pipelines, and code quality tooling, improving project delivery efficiency by 10%.

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## Notable Projects & Speaking

**Next.js Conf 2024** -- Presented "Incrementally Migrating to Next.js from a Client-Side-Only App" to a global audience, detailing Peloton's multi-year migration strategy, performance gains, and architectural decisions. [Watch the talk](https://youtu.be/Z77fshyTF3w)

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## Technical Skills

**Languages:** TypeScript, JavaScript, Python, Kotlin
**Frameworks:** React, Next.js, GraphQL (Apollo, Federation), Node.js
**Infrastructure:** Vercel, AWS, Google Cloud, Cloudflare, Docker, Kubernetes
**CI/CD & Tooling:** GitHub Actions, NX, Turborepo, Datadog, Vercel SDK
**Databases:** PostgreSQL, MySQL, NoSQL (DynamoDB, Firestore)
**Architecture:** Microfrontends, Monorepo management, Edge computing, Federated GraphQL, REST APIs

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## Education

**Michigan State University** -- B.S. Media & Information, Interactive Media Design