Martin Laws — Resumé

At Shopify, I've fused and levelled up everything I've learned to grow and lead teams and the technology they deliver. As a Staff Developer focused on Custom Data and Assets, I was responsible for Images, Videos, Files, 3D, Metafields, and Metaobjects across Shopify.

Prior to this, I managed Shopify’s App Developer Experience team, where I was responsible for the user interfaces, APIs, and tooling that make it possible for developers to build apps on Shopify’s platform. I grew the team from 3=>12 and took pride in fostering an inclusive engineering culture that celebrated innovation and continuous improvement. My leadership has resulted in more intuitive, powerful experiences for Shopify developers; and career growth for the folks I managed.

I did some of my most ambitious and creative work as the founder of my own UX development studio. I worked with exceptional clients including The Globe and Mail, where I reimagined the technology powering their subscription experience: providing consulting, strategy, and expert front end development services. Building my own practice allowed me to pivot from exclusively building functional, practical tools to creative projects. I delivered technical prototyping for a variety of startups, helping them quickly bring new ideas to market. I built high-trust, no-bullshit client relationships and learned the hard truth that you can’t ship truly great products without a team having a great time building them.

I shared my evolving expertise and supported new developers as an instructor at Lighthouse Labs. This included weekly lectures on a range of topics, including advanced workshops on modern JavaScript, React, Vue.js, and CSS best practices. I co-authored curriculum material taught in eight cities to over 2,000 students.

This is where I lived the “startup dream”. Joining as employee ~30, I led the front-end team's 4x expansion while the company grew to 110+ employees, dominating >85% of the Canadian seed-to-sale Cannabis compliance software market and powering its legalization nation-wide. I shaped technical strategy with executives, levelled up product interfaces, designed team structures and HR processes, and implemented a FED<>UX lifecycle. I managed all front-end developers, modernized the tech stack, and was ultimately responsible for all user-facing apps and open-source projects.