Hi! I'm Mike. I'm a technologist focusing on internal product and CRM admin, data, and digital strategy. I mostly work in progressive politics, but the technical solutions I publish here offer value for a range of organizations and companies. I focus on solutions that require little to no code and are accessible to non-developers.
On this site, I document the technical solutions to problems I encounter on the platforms I use most frequently (primarily Salesforce, EveryAction / NGP VAN, Airtable, and Google Sheets), and other knowledge related to my work.
Why this blog?
It’s an extremely common practice for developers to document the technical problems they encounter and publish their solutions online so that other developers can benefit from, and contribute to, their work.
Unfortunately, for non-developer technologists and other digital workers, the norm of documenting problems and solutions is less well-established. While there are a number of online resources for lower-tech technical knowledge—some popular Salesforce blogs, spreadsheet and Airtable forums, etc.— there are plenty of gaps, and I’ve struggled to find coherent guides for the problems I regularly encounter in my technical work.
I’ve seen firsthand how this information ecosystem disadvantages less well-resourced groups and organizations. At the small and mid-size nonprofits where I’ve spent most of my career, efforts to unravel the under-documented behavior of digital products, evaluate how best to use them, and create documentation for staff consumed much of my time. It was frustrating to spend so many hours developing solutions to problems others had likely already solved. More importantly, it limited my capacity for strategic, high-level work. At organizations with even fewer resources, or no one on staff with the capacity to research technical solutions, the scarcity of technical information can prevent valuable work from happening at all.
The current shortage of easy-to-understand low-tech technical information amplifies technical gaps, which in turn can widen resource gaps. I'm interested in helping to close these gaps by documenting knowledge related to the work I do.
Contact
If you have feedback, questions, or you’re interested in working with me, I’d love to hear from you. You can email me at mike [at] this domain.
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