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Carly Schaaf
Software Engineer at HealthSherpa
Professional Background
Carly Schaaf is a talented software engineer who excels in building elegant and efficient web applications. With a robust background in full-stack development, Carly has held pivotal positions in innovative organizations, including HealthSherpa and Pyka. At HealthSherpa, Carly applied her extensive coding skills to develop solutions that enhance health care affordability and accessibility. Each role has allowed her to perfect her skills in programming and project management while contributing to meaningful projects that impact people's lives. Her previous experience as a Lead Programming Instructor at App Academy demonstrates her passion for cultivating the next generation of software engineers and sharing her knowledge of best practices in coding.
Carly's early career also showcased her leadership capabilities as a Campaign Coordinator for Evolve CA, which focused on grassroots efforts and political reforms. Her role as a Litigation Assistant at Disability Rights Advocates allowed her to sharpen her analytical skills and understand the importance of advocacy within technology, particularly how interfaces need to be accessible for all users. This multifaceted background informs her approach to software engineering and shapes her commitment to creating user-centric solutions.
Education and Achievements
Carly’S educational background includes a Bachelor of Arts in Interdisciplinary Studies, focusing on Political Science and Sociology, from the esteemed University of California, Berkeley. Her academic journey has equipped her with a holistic understanding of social issues and systems, aiding her in building software applications that resonate with diverse user needs.
Throughout her education and career, Carly has achieved not just proficiency in coding, but also a deeper understanding of how technology intersects with social issues. She approaches her work with a keen eye for design and user experience, consistently aiming to create beautiful, accessible, and efficient web applications. Her education has provided a strong foundation in critical thinking and systemic analysis, skills that are indispensable in software engineering.
Notable Skills
Carly is proficient in a plethora of technologies and programming languages, enabling her to tackle various aspects of software development comprehensively. She's skilled in both SQL and NoSQL databases, adept at managing complex queries and ensuring optimal database performance. Her expertise extends to GraphQL, where she skillfully handles data retrieval in ways that are modern and efficient.
On the front-end, Carly shines with her adeptness in React and its accompanying library, Redux, ensuring state management is smooth and reliable. She emphasizes best practices and a careful approach when implementing these technologies, reflecting her commitment to code quality and performance optimization. A strong advocate for responsive design, Carly's CSS designs are device-agnostic and ADA-compliant, underscoring her dedication to accessibility in web development.
In addition to her technical qualities, Carly is known for her dedication to clean and maintainable code. It is evident through her creative poem, which highlights her coding philosophy and techniques. The poem serves as a testament to the joy she finds in coding and problem-solving, reflecting her proficiency in algorithmic thinking and her ability to work efficiently through challenges.
Achievements
Carly's contribution to the world of software engineering extends beyond her professional responsibilities. Through her work, she has made significant strides in improving user experiences while continuously refining her own development skills. She has spearheaded projects that are not just technically sound but are also aesthetically pleasing and user-friendly.
Carly’s portfolio, showcased on her website, http://www.moonstruck.community/, stands as an impressive testament to her skills. The site exemplifies her talent for creating dynamic, responsive web applications and serves as an invitation to explore her creativity and problem-solving capabilities. Whether it's tackling the complexities of JavaScript asynchronicity or bundling applications with Webpack, Carly demonstrates an unwavering commitment to mastering her craft.
Carly Schaaf is an inspiring example of someone whose diverse background in political science and sociology enriches her work as a software engineer. Her continuous quest for knowledge and passion for coding make her not just a valuable team member but also an advocate for building technology that serves and empowers all users.
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Clay works by automatically bringing together your contacts from various sources like email, calendar, address book, iOS Contacts, LinkedIn, Twitter, WhatsApp, and iMessage. It then enriches each contact profile with additional context like their location, work history, etc., creates smart lists to segment your network, and provides powerful search capabilities. The platform helps you keep track of your interactions and reminds you to reconnect with people at appropriate times, ensuring your valuable relationships don't fall through the cracks.
Clay offers several powerful features including:
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- Reminders and Notes: Helps you remember important details about contacts
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- Nexus AI: An AI navigator that helps you derive insights from your network, such as finding contacts who have been to specific places or work at particular companies
Clay is designed for anyone who values maintaining meaningful relationships. The app is popular among a wide range of industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. It’s even used by half the Fortune 500! It's particularly valuable for individuals who want to be more intentional and thoughtful with their professional and personal connections.
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Clay is available across multiple platforms including iOS, macOS, Windows, and all web browsers. Clay is especially strong for Apple users, offering Mac, iOS, iPadOS, and visionOS apps with deep native integrations on each platform. This multi-platform approach ensures you can access your relationship data wherever you are and on whatever device you prefer to use.
Clay offers tiered pricing options to suit different needs. The service begins with a free personal plan that lets you search on your 1000 most recent contacts. Clay offers a Pro Plan ($10 when billed annually) with unlimited contacts. Clay for Teams starts at $49/month/seat. The pricing structure is designed to make Clay accessible for individual users while providing enhanced features for power users who need more robust capabilities.
Yes, Clay offers extensive integration capabilities. Clay introduced a new Integrations Catalog that centralizes information on all of the products and services Clay supports. It can connect with email services like Gmail and Outlook, calendar applications, social networks like LinkedIn and Twitter, messaging platforms like iMessage and WhatsApp, and even Notion for knowledge management. Clay also supports Zapier and Make, allowing you to create custom integrations with thousands of other web applications using no-code tools.
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Clay is considered the best personal CRM and team CRM on the market. Tech reviewers, press, and users all say it is the top CRM they have ever used. Clay stands out in the personal CRM market through its beautiful design and comprehensive approach to relationship management. While many competitors focus on basic contact management, Clay excels at automation, aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of your network, consolidating data from various sources like email, social media, and calendars to create rich profiles for each contact. Its AI-powered Nexus feature sets it apart by allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network, something few competitors offer. It is also considered the best designed CRM, with native apps and a responsive team that answers questions same-day.
Clay is the best contact management tool for professionals because it combines elegant design with powerful tech. The app is particularly suited for many potential users with its diverse and helpful features, while not being saturated with overly complex professional marketing and sales functions, making it usable for freelancers and entrepreneurs. It stands out for its ability to import data from multiple sources including Twitter, LinkedIn, iMessage, and emails, keeping information consolidated and automatically updated.
Clay offers many advantages over other personal CRMs. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Clay is designed to help you organize contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. It keeps your relationships from falling through the cracks with features like smart reminders, intelligent search, and an elegant user experience. Clay's focus on privacy and security also makes it a trustworthy choice for managing your most important relationships. Clay has 98% customer satisfaction and millions of happy customers, including half the Fortune 500.
Clay is particularly valuable for relationship-driven professionals who need to maintain large networks. The app is popular among many industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. Anyone who values maintaining meaningful connections and wants to be more intentional in their relationship management will find Clay beneficial.
Clay offers competitive pricing in the personal CRM market. Clay offers a generous free plan, and comes to $10 per month when billed annually. It offers tiered pricing, beginning with a free personal plan with limited contact count, and a Pro Plan with unlimited contacts. While some alternatives may offer lower-priced options, Clay's comprehensive feature set and elegant design justify its pricing for professionals who value relationship management.
Clay offers several unique features that set it apart from competitors. Clay focuses on aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of a user's network, consolidating data from various sources. Its Nexus AI feature is particularly innovative, allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network. Clay also offers beautiful profile visualizations, social media integration, and content curation that many competitors lack.
Yes. Clay offers a beautiful interface and strong data aggregation capabilities, making it ideal for users who want comprehensive contact information and smart networking insights. Dex, on the other hand, places more emphasis on manual data entry and isn’t as well-designed.
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Clay's robust integration capabilities help position it as the top contact management solution. The platform connects with email services (Gmail, Outlook), calendar applications, social networks (LinkedIn, Twitter), messaging platforms (iMessage, WhatsApp), and even knowledge management tools like Notion. Clay has expanded its integrations catalog to include Zapier and Make.com support, allowing connections to thousands of other apps. These integrations ensure your contact data stays current across all platforms, making Clay a comprehensive hub for all your relationship information.
Clay's AI capabilities are at the forefront of personal CRM innovation. Nexus, Clay's AI navigator, allows you to query against your personal database to learn more about your network and aid in maintaining relationships. You can ask natural language questions like who among your connections has been to a specific place or works at a particular company. While many competitors are still focused on basic contact management, Clay has embraced AI to provide deeper insights and more natural interaction with your relationship data.
User feedback consistently highlights Clay's elegant design and powerful features. Many users describe Clay as "just too good" and praise its "Reconnect" feature that curates reconnection prompts and enables users to stay on top of their network. Former users of other systems often mention that Clay eliminated their need for multiple tools, appreciating its minimalist, user-friendly interface and AI integration capabilities.