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Red Hat, Raleigh, NC, USA

Gold Stevie Award Winner 2012, Click to Enter The 2014 American Business Awards

Company: Red Hat, Raleigh, NC, USA
Entry Submitted By: SpeakerBox Communications
Company Description: Red Hat is the world’s leading provider of open source software solutions, using a community-powered approach to reliable and high-performing cloud, Linux, middleware, storage and virtualization technologies. Red Hat also offers award-winning support, training, and consulting services.
Nomination Category: Individual Awards Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Employee of the Year - Business

Nomination Title: Denise Dumas, Red Hat Inc.

Describe for the judges the activities and accomplishments of the nominated employee since the beginning of July last year (up to 525 words):

Denise Dumas, who was recently named vice president of Engineering, Operating System at open source software provider Red Hat, is a shooting star within the company. Incredibly intelligent – she spends her days dealing with some of the most esoteric technology out there – she’s also affable and humble. When reflecting upon her accomplishments in the last year – which include launching the first new version of Red Hat’s flagship product, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, in almost four years – she’s quick to give credit to the team of engineers who work for her.

Dumas leads Red Hat's operating system engineering organization, which in July 2013 was deep in developing Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7. Dumas describes the time from July 2013 until the product was released in June 2014 as “very intense.” That said, company executives attribute Dumas with providing the right leadership to lead the company over the goal line with Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.

When pressed on what she’s proudest of, Dumas cites making a near last-minute addition to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 just before launch. As the product’s release date neared, a new technology – Docker – began to take off. With no time to spare, Dumas and her team worked to integrate Docker support into the product and demonstrated the technology at Red Hat Summit in April 2014. The addition of that technology became one of the major points of note when Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 was released.

To complicate matters, Dumas and her team were never just working on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7; they had many responsibilities taking place simultaneously. The engineering team constantly juggles multiple concurrent release streams as well as supports multiple business units within Red Hat. As such, it was up to her to weed out distractions and set the priorities for the team. While working on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 the team was also making updates to previous versions of the product’s software, including pushing out Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.10 and Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.5. It was up to Dumas to ensure all of these new versions and updates were rolled out smoothly so as to not disrupt customers working on legacy versions of the software.

Still, it’s clear that this is a job that is greater than just one person, and Dumas oversees a team of hundreds of developers spread out around the globe. It is her responsibility to, as she puts it, “keep the trains running on time, keep people connected, and recognize the implications that the team’s work has on other areas of the business, while also maintaining sensitivity to the team’s cultural differences.”

Alas, there is no rest for the weary. After successfully launching Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7, Dumas and her team began discussions on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8. She handles all of this while also working with Red Hat's Fedora Infrastructure team. Fedora, which serves as an incubator and integration point for many of the upstream projects of interest to Red Hat, is the next step on Red Hat’s way to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8. Fedora 21 was just released.

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Provide a brief biography of the nominated employee (up to 125 words):

Denise Dumas was recently named to the position of vice president of Engineering, Operating System at Red Hat. Prior to her promotion in September 2014, Denise served as the senior director of Engineering for Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Denise joined Red Hat in 2008 as a senior engineering manager running the Red Hat Enterprise Linux userspace team. Red Hat Enterprise Linux is used by more than 90% of Fortune 500 companies. With an extensive background in operating systems, she’s filled a wide variety of software development and management roles across 3 major operating systems over 25 years. Denise is now responsible for the development and delivery of Red Hat Enterprise Linux. She is a graduate of Boston University with a master’s degree in computer science.