Eric Hislop

Profile

I’m a senior software engineer and emerging leader with over 10 years of experience delivering value through robust engineering practices, modern cloud solutions, and a strong focus on collaboration. I’ve recently embraced the challenge of stepping into a leadership role to help my team work more effectively together and deliver complex initiatives. I’m passionate about growing inclusive engineering cultures, supporting people through change, and applying technology to solve meaningful problems. I bring a balance of strategic thinking, hands-on technical depth, and a calm, people-first leadership style that supports both delivery and long-term capability growth.

Experience

Xero

Wellington, NZ

Engineering Team Lead

Oct 2023 – May 2025

  • People leadership: Conducted regular 1:1s focused on career progression, wellbeing, and mentoring.
  • Stakeholder communication: Presented updates and demos to senior leaders and stakeholders for visibility and alignment.
  • Delivery and team health: Partnered with Lead Engineers and Product Managers for a clear, prioritised backlog; supported quarterly/annual planning.
  • Goal setting and performance: Facilitated goal-setting, led performance reviews, and participated in cross-team calibration.
  • Stepped into Team Lead role during pivotal organisational shift (CAB process introduction).
  • Led team to support CAB by driving adoption of Deployment Tracking and delivering new tooling for safer deployments.
  • Headed a cross-functional initiative integrating deployment guardrails across GitHub Actions, TeamCity, and LaunchDarkly.
  • Collaborated closely with infrastructure, release, and platform teams on governance and rollout strategy.
  • Leadership
  • Mentoring
  • Stakeholder Management
  • Delivery
  • Change Management
  • Collaboration

Senior Engineer

Feb 2022 – Oct 2023

  • Focused on maintaining and enhancing Xero's internal developer portal to catalogue components and boost engineer productivity.
  • Actively supported transition to a SaaS-based developer portal (Cortex), facilitating data transfer and enhancing system functionality.
  • Modernised a deployment tracking tool (DeployTrack) and rolled it out across Xero.
  • Worked on defining and measuring Engineering standards using the internal developer portal.
  • Led Cortex projects integrating services like GitHub, Kubernetes, Google, Jira, and Slack, improving developer experience.
  • Advocated for Cortex, conducting presentations and demos to increase engagement.
  • Engaged deeply with cloud technologies (AWS) and Kubernetes for complex deployments.
  • Conducted workshops and training on new tools and practices.
  • JavaScript
  • Node.js
  • C#
  • AWS
  • Kubernetes
  • Backstage
  • Terraform
  • SQL
  • Git
  • Swagger
  • Jira
  • Confluence

Contact Energy

Wellington, NZ

Senior Full Stack Developer

May 2021 - Feb 2022

  • Worked on a Kotlin-based platform for ingesting and normalising partner data for internal and customer-facing applications (Simply Energy, a Contact Energy subsidiary).
  • Collaborated with Sales to implement new opportunities/workflows in Salesforce.
  • Researched, trialled, and implemented NPS tools to improve customer feedback loops.
  • Designed and implemented integrations across a range of internal and external systems.
  • Collaborated with Architects and Product Owners to translate business requirements into scalable, serverless solutions on AWS.
  • Delivered RESTful APIs using the Serverless Framework and AWS services (Lambda, API Gateway, DynamoDB) to power account management, payments, meter reads, and usage data for web, mobile, and IVR platforms.
  • Led the orchestration of end-to-end customer journeys by integrating with the Electricity/Gas Registry, broadband provisioning APIs, and UiPath RPA bots to automate manual workflows.
  • Rebuilt the consumption API by migrating from SAP OData to PostgreSQL (RDS), achieving over a 90% reduction in response time (6s to <600ms) in production.
  • JavaScript
  • Node.js
  • AWS
  • Serverless Framework
  • Lambda
  • API Gateway
  • DynamoDB
  • SQS
  • RDS
  • PostgreSQL
  • UiPath
  • Kotlin
  • Salesforce
  • PostgreSQL

Impac Services ltd

Wellington, NZ

Full Stack Developer

May 2018 - Jul 2018

  • Contributed to developing Shield, a new .NET Core and Angular health and safety product.
  • Gathered requirements from NZ business users.
  • Trained offshore developers on the Shield application.
  • C#
  • .NET Core
  • Angular
  • JavaScript

iQualify

Lower Hutt, NZ

Full Stack Developer

Apr 2015 - Apr 2018

  • Developed a modern online learning platform (Angular, Express.js) enhancing learner experience and providing analytics.
  • Worked on core applications for consumption, creation, and management of online learning content.
  • Collected analytics on new features to track user engagement and inform product improvements.
  • JavaScript
  • Node.js
  • Angular
  • Express.js

FMG

Palmerston North, NZ

Software Developer

Oct 2014 - Mar 2015

  • Completed internship leading to full-time employment in Business Information Services.
  • Gained experience in IT operations within a large organisation.
  • JavaScript
  • SharePoint

Education

Bachelor of Information and Communication Technology

UCOL

2011 - 2014

Specialised in software engineering.

photo of me

Skills

    • Programming Languages
    • JavaScript
    • TypeScript
    • C#
    • SQL
    • Terraform
    • Kotlin
    • Bash
      Cloud & AWS
    • AWS (General)
    • S3
    • Lambda
    • API Gateway
    • DynamoDB
    • SQS
    • Secrets Manager
    • CloudWatch
    • Cognito
    • RDS
      Frameworks & Libraries
    • Node.js
    • Express.js
    • Angular
    • React
    • Backstage
    • Serverless Framework
    • Hugo
    • Strapi
      Developer Tools & Platforms
    • Git
    • Swagger
    • Docker
    • TeamCity
    • Kubernetes
    • Salesforce
    • Jira
    • Confluence
    • Miro
      Practices & Methodologies
    • Agile development
    • Test Driven Development (TDD)
    • Continuous Delivery (CD)
    • Trunk Based Development
    • Pair programming
      Leadership & Collaboration
    • People Leadership
    • Mentoring
    • Stakeholder Management
    • Performance Reviews
    • Goal Setting
    • Collaboration
      Misc
    • Prompt Engineer 🤖

Interests

  • Bargain hunting
  • Blogging
  • Gaming
  • DIY
  • Family time
  • MTG