Mike Dunninger's README

My Role and Responsibilities

As your manager, I will do all I can to make it possible for you to succeed professionally. That means I will strive to do at least the following…

• Provide you with the tools to do your job
• Coach and mentor you in career development
• Bring you information from the rest of GitLab
• Shield you from outside pressures
• Set clear expectations for you & give clear feedback
• Be available for you to lean on me
• Give you many opportunities to stand on your own two feet

I Expect

• honesty, integrity and professionalism
• that you share and will act in accordance with GitLab’s Values
• understanding of GitLab’s business and goals
• full participation
• creative thinking
• ownership – of your career, of your actions
• teamwork – support each other
  • Do your fair share of work
  • Ask for help, and be available to help
  • Be reliable and timely
• adherence to team and company policies & processes
• respect for each other, our company, and our customers
• for all of us to have fun

I Believe

• in the individual
• in the team
• in the customer
• in doing what’s right
• that communication is at the heart of all of our successes and most of our failures
• that customer support and service can be a competitive differentiator for GitLab
• in time off

Working with Me

• Need something from me? No need to schedule a meeting in advance. Just contact me on Slack or send me an email.
• I appreciate when people get to the point quickly instead of working around to it slowly. It’s not that I’m in a hurry; I just like to get to the heart of the matter.
• Similarly, I tend to be pretty direct and straightforward. If it’s too much for you, please just let me know and I’ll do my best to adjust.
• I seek only useful, beneficial change - pretty much never change for the sake of change.
• I want to be the most helpful, useful, supportive manager I can be for each person on my team. So please tell me:
  • what I’m doing well, and should therefore keep doing
  • what I can do better
  • what I should start doing
  • what I should stop doing
• I try very hard to write or say exactly what I mean, with no hidden agenda or secrets. If there’s information you want but that I can’t give you, I’ll let you know. But I won’t make stuff up, and I won’t make you guess. So you shouldn’t need to read between the lines.

Personal History

• B.A. in Computer Studies from Northwestern U. (Go Wildcats!)
• M.S. in Computer Science from U. Wisconsin
• Moved to Colorado in 1989 to start my career
• Remarried in 2012 to Kim, an amazing woman who’s taught middle school choir for many years and is a beautiful singer specializing in choral music

Personal Interests

• American Football - Denver Broncos season ticket holder, and a big fan of my alma mater, Northwestern
• Cooking and baking
• Travel - favorite places so far are New Orleans, San Francisco, Tuscany (Italy) and Kauai, Hawaii
• Movies, plays, musicals and music
• Crossword puzzles, other word puzzles, number puzzles
• Reading and writing

Professional History

• 10 years in HP’s Graphics Software Lab as a software engineer and a software development process engineer
• 8 years at Rational Software (IBM) building and leading the Premium Support team
• 7 more years at HP as an enterprise support manager and then a support team manager
• 4+ years at LogRhythm as a support engineer and support manager
• joined GitLab in 2020!

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