Vincent Chu Tinkerer | Leader | Innovator

Product & Engineering leader in SaaS.
Passionate with technology. Worked at Electronic Arts and Apple before venturing into the startup world.

About Me...

I have a wide range of experience in many technical areas, and I love innovating with new tools and technology to make people's lives easier. I started working professionally in software development since 2003, but my first "Hello World" program can be traced all the way back to 1990 with QBasic.

I must say I'm passionate with software development! I've been developing software on various hardware platforms, including PC, Wii, NDS, XBox, PS3, Mac and iOS devices. I did a lot of frontend work when I was working at Apple, and I also developed business analytic software using Scala at Visier.

I've been credited on a number of game titles when I was at Electronic Arts, including the top-selling AAA title FIFA (2010, 2011, 2012). My main focus area was in locomotion - developing complex animation algorithms for simulating realistic players movement. I've also worked at Apple on the iWork productivity suite (iOS and iCloud.com) for close to four years.

After leaving Apple, I started working for Visier, a rapidly growing company that's transforming the HR domain. As Vice President of engineering I was responsible for project direction, technical direction and people management.

After 7 years in the HR tech space, I joined Later.com as head of engineering. I'm proud of helping them scale the product and engineering processes, and the company managed to have a successful exit in 2022.

In 2023, I started with AgencyAnalytics as Chief Product Development Officer. I reframed the conversation around development velocity to focus on measuring product metrics that can impact business outcomes. I also defined a product strategy framework, collaboratively introduced and rolled out a strategic plan for Product, Engineering, and GTM. Through setting clear expectations, hiring and training, I established new critical Product & Engineering functions (Product Management, Design, UX, DevOps and QA).

My Articles...

I started writing about the books I read and my thoughts on leadership in 2020. I published them on LinkedIn, and they receive quite a bit of attention from my fellow technical leaders. Here are the links to some of the articles I wrote:

Books on a bookshelf of a software manager (Part 1: Coaching)

Books on a bookshelf of a software manager (Part 2: Organization)

Defining culture: leading by example

What motivates software engineers?

High standards vs toxic environment

Peacetime vs Wartime

Ego - Books on a bookshelf of a software manager

Product Management for Software Developers

3 Pitfalls to warch out for when creating your own metrics

Pull Request, Vincent Chu

Why you should consider joining a small or medium sized company as a senior software developer

Should you become an engineering manager in 2022?

I also spent some time with Tensorflow using Google Colaboratory. I created a English to Cantonese language translation prototype with explanations on what was done. This is of course much less impressive now with the general availability of Generative AI in recent years.

My University...

I have to admit I love learning, and I spent a lot of time on my study when I was in Simon Fraser University. In 2007, I received the Governor General Silver Medal for being the top undergraduate in the university. SFU did a short interview with me in 2015.

I love programming and I often turned class projects and assignment into larger scale projects available for public download. I'm pleased to see that my software projects have proved themselves to be useful for others as well.

I was also actively involved in Golden Key International Honor Society as an executive member, and was the vice president for the SFU Chapter. We often organized various volunteering events to help the needy in the community and being an exec was a lot of fun.

I was also affiliated with the SFU Medical Image Analysis Lab since my USRA work with Dr. Hamarneh. I made paper publications with SPIE for the research work and had also attended their international conferences.

Professional Interests...

I have a huge interest in cryptography and machine learning, and I love creating tools and apps to make advanced algorithms accessible to the general public. Nothing brings me more joy than helping others save time with their tasks. I have created a number of open source projects, and I have worked on many hobby software projects.

My Hobbies...

I feel very lucky that I get to love to do, and I love software and game development! I also enjoy teaching and building things with Lego. In the past, I spent quite a bit of time on video games - Starcraft and Warcraft remain my favorite games of all times.

I also enjoy doing sports for recreation or just simply hanging out with all family and friends. I love playing board games, especially competitive ones like Carcassonne and Ricochet Robots.

While I'm not writing code, I like going outdoors and enjoy the beautiful hiking trails in Greater Vancouver.

My Pictures...

The picture area is password protected. Please feel free to access it using any of the two accounts described below (biology or flying2003) or contact me.

Password

I have created two accounts, and you can use either one to gain access:

username: biology
password: (The last name of our I.B. Biology Teacher <My year of course, without capitalization and salutation>)

username: flying2003
password: (It's the usual subject of my drawings.)

My work...

If you are interested in knowing more about my work or in possible collaborations, you can contact me using any of the methods listed here.