Chaoyue Zhao

My name is Chao (pronunciation ‘ciao’). I go by the first letter of my first name, Chaoyue. I am currently a Frontend Engineer at GitLab, specifically the Source Code group in the Create Stage. This README is my work portrait that tells you a little bit about the work me.

🖼️ About the handle

My first ever Javascript project, when I was in coding bootcamp, was a Mondrian generator. One of my friends who writes for films mentioned “ms.mondrian” would make a dope screen name. That has stuck with me ever since. My dream is to have someone paint their wall with a mondrian generated from my app.

🥳 Fun Facts

• I am an only child.

• I was born and raised in Beijing, China and came to Canada for university when I was 19. I lived in Ottawa for 6 years, before moving to Toronto.

• I am a software developer without a CS degree. I studied Communication Studies and Psychology. This was my undergraduate thesis research: Operand-order Specificity in Single-digit Multiplication and Addition: An Eye Moment Study of Chinese-educated Adults. In a previous life, I planned B2B events for living.

• I am a ENFJ.

• POTTERY IS LIFE.

• I wrote a poem in Jan 2024 and I thought it was fun:

  I wish us endless cool product feature dreams and the furious desire to realize some of them.
  I wish us the eagle eyes to track down those bugs, before they make it to staging.
  I wish us to respect the differences of ourselves, because the worth and virtues of each person often remain to be discovered.\ I wish us at last to never give up the search for what work means for us holistically.\ I wish us above all the comfort to show up as our true selves and the damn good vibe.

🥅 Goals:

1 year goal:

Get promoted to senior or on my way to there.

Long term goal (5 years+):

Currently I would like to explore the people management route as I really enjoy mentorship. I like to help people find their niche.

🦸🏻‍♀️ Superpowers

• Communication: I value both synchronous and asynchronous communication, understand the subtle differences between the two and constantly push myself and others to properly leverage both. I care and write technical documentations. I learn in public by sharing my learnings formally and informally.
• Empathy: I develop a great sense of empathy through my undergraduate degree in communication & psychology and my past career as an event manager. I celebrate the diversity in points of views folks bring to the table, based on their own experience and expertise.
• Humility: I once was told to take work seriously, not as myself. I believe, no matter how many years of experience one has on anything, there is always room for curiosity.

🙏 Weaknesses and how you can help me 😊

• Patience: I am learning things that take time, especially the better ones. The best time could be now, but more often than not, it’s a bit later. Please help me to slow down and give space for others.
• Working in a larger company: I am new to GitLab and companies this size. I am learning my way around navigating a large code base and things on this scale. Please share what you know about GitLab (company, product, code base, culture and beyond).
• Overcommitting: I’ve got this feedback often. I am consciously prioritizing what I can do myself vs delegate. Please remind me to do this, if you see the chance to do so.

👠 Work Style

Dev Day to Day

• I prioritize code reviews over my own work, unless I am putting out production fire. My code review is extremely detailed. I pick apart every single line change. I ask a lot of questions. I will use nit to signify, which can be left to the discretion of the author. I provide a high level summary with actionable in the code review summary itself.
• I use Git history a lot to find a person to unblock myself.
• I choose boring solutions. I consider clever code harmful. In other words, readability for the win.
• I aim to not be a bus factor on anything. Sharing is caring.
• I do well and don’t mind them. But I want to spend most of my time, not being a glue.

Asynchronous vs Synchronous Communication

• I default to ask questions and start conversations in public slack channels. I personally believe that it speeds up getting an answer while promoting inclusivity and transparency.
• My ideal workday is a nice balance of individual head down time and synchronous collaboration with the team.
• I prefer slack messages first and then in person/google meets/zoom/huddle chats so I can have context for our conversations.
• I am a heavy emoji user. I would use emojis to say thank you or acknowledge I have read a message, instead of typing out a message.
• I tend to need time to process information before providing answers.

Meetings

• If possible, please avoid booking me on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays as I like to leave out 2 days a week to be focus time only .
• I care a lot about meeting hygiene.
  • I prefer to go to meetings with an agenda/ a list of things that we hope to achieve/ pre-reads / pre-work and a clear invite list.
  • I would like to see meetings open up with a clear understanding of what hope the outcomes will be.
  • After them, a second out a meeting notes, action items and owners.

Work Philosophy

• Value excellent user experience for all, developer experience and build to last.
• Productivity for me means spending time intentionally, effectively and enjoyable.
• I am in the high growth period of my career so I want to do work that “set the bar high, just out of reach”, knowing there are people who would support me.
• I thrive on improving the process so we can all work better together.
• I find it’s hard to proceed when people stop caring.
• I like my boundaries to be respected and I try my best to respect others’.
• I like to push for repeated processes to get automated and templatize.

Others

• I like to be guided to find my own answers vs being fed directly what to do.
• I tend to talk and think and can go on tangents. I am open to being told that I am running off-topic.
• I believe one can’t listen when they talk or wait for their chance to speak.
• I like to receive feedback on a timely basis and I LOVE them, positive or constructive. - I like to receive constructive feedback with potential discussion afterwards on how to do better.
• I like to receive recognition/kudos publicly.
• I love PEOPLE. Crowds energize me. Even though I am extremely extroverted, I need my me time too.

🤝 Preferred management style

• For me, a good EM understands the role is very different from coding/ individual contributors. EM wears many many different hats. Some of these includes:
  • Coach
  • Cheerleader
  • Mentor
  • Party planner
  • Peacemaker
  • Shot caller
  • Speaker of the house
  • Notetaker
  • Project manager
  • Salesperson (sell the team to other stakeholders)
• For me, A good EM knows everything is built on trust. Trusting the good people you hire can do the job and do a great job on their own and GET OUT OF THE WAY.
• For me, A good EM is a Vulnerable leader. It’s the person who admits what they don’t know, apologizes publicly and understands “work is important, but it’s not one whole self”.
• For me, A good EM understands the importance of 1:1s and uses them as opportunities for ongoing career conversations.