I've spent nearly 25 years building software and leading product and engineering teams — from scrappy bootstrapped ventures to global public companies. 

Through successes, failures, and a lot of learning, I’ve been fortunate to work alongside world-class engineers, creatives, and leaders. That experience taught me what truly moves the progress needle: helping teams and people cut through the noise and align around shared context and meaningful work.

Today, I’m channeling that into Steady — an AI-native platform for coordinating digital teams without the overhead. Steady implements a set of open-source principles I helped develop called Continuous Coordination. Steady is a modern, human-first approach to work that aligns people with real-time context and helps teams deliver better and faster — without burnout.

Henry Poydar

Brian Runk

Engineering Leadership / Research & Development

Engineering leader who scales organizations at growth-stage B2B SaaS companies. Built and led teams of 20+ engineers at Etsy, Constant Contact, and Sparkfund (a clean energy financing platform) delivering products serving millions of users. Specialize in the complex work growth requires: platform migrations, system modernizations, and team scaling during periods of significant organizational change. Recent focus on AI and ML integration while leading R&D at FINRA. Co-workers describe: "exceptional leadership," "unmatched ability to build high-performing teams," "best manager I've ever worked for."

Approach centers on removing barriers and focusing collective efforts on problems that provide the biggest lift. Led platform migrations at Etsy (10M+ messages/hour), Constant Contact (650K+ customers), and Sparkfund while maintaining business continuity and high team retention. Established Agile processes, CI/CD pipelines, and collaboration across Product, Design, and Operations that enable teams to ship predictably and iterate quickly.

Build engineering organizations from the ground up through deliberate talent development and culture focused on quality and continuous improvement, leading to delivery of outcomes such as unified database architectures, single sign-on implementations, high-traffic distributed systems, and business continuity planning during major technology transitions. Experience spans Digital Media, Enterprise Software, and Consumer Software, with expertise in DevOps, full-stack development, and a people-centered approach to leadership.

🌻🦀🚣🏻 brian@brianrunk.net https://brianrunk.net

Director, Technology

Research & Development

Does your office need a dog?
Holly has experience supporting teams at America's Test Kitchen, Constant Contact, Etsy and Sparkfund.

She also comes with an engineering leader attached as an added bonus.

Contact her for availability and begin boosting morale & productivity today!

engineering management / human leadership

Happy 2026, Everyone! I’m seeking a new role and would appreciate your support.  If you hear of any opportunities or just want to catch up, please send me a message or comment below. I’d love to reconnect. #OpenToWork

💼 About me & what I’m looking for

I’m looking for any of the following : Vice President of Software Engineering, Senior Director of Software Engineering,Director of Software Engineering,  Senior Software Engineering Manager, and Software Engineering Manager roles.

Title matters far less than team & opportunity for impact!

My background spans platform and customer-facing products, scaling teams, improving reliability and developer experience, and aligning engineering decisions with business priorities.

🌎 I’m open to remote roles as well as onsite/hybrid in the Washington DC-Baltimore Area.

⭐ I’ve previously worked at FINRA and Etsy.

Again, if you know of teams hiring for leadership like this, I’d appreciate an introduction or a note. 🙏🏻

Looking for Vice President of Software Engineering, Director of Software Engineering, Senior Director of Software Engineering, Senior Software Engineering Manager and Software Engineering Manager roles

While in the midst of my search, I have availability for  paid coaching sessions.  

I've assisted engineers and teams with career coaching and around practical process and planning improvements. 

If you want a session with clear takeaways, message and let me know what you’re trying to solve.

taplio

The Battle

Henry Poydar

Brian Runk

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taplio

The Battle

Henry Poydar

Brian Runk

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Brian Runk's LinkedIn Performance

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Performance ScoreBrian Runk's LinkedIn Performance