
Work
My passion for software development, process improvement, and helping others be happy in their work lives has led me from working as a software developer, to being a tech lead and then an application architect. Now I’m writing a book to share my knowledge from 25+ years in tech.
I recently completed my PMI-ACP certification – Agile Certified Practitioner, from the Project Management Institute. I’m a big fan of agile as a mindset.
I’m not looking for a new role, but you can find my resume here.
Why Leaf?
When I was in college, a friend of mine called me by my email username (jroy, at the time). I said that was like calling me by my social security number. “If you’re not going to call me by my right name, at least come up with a new name for me.” They did.
Here we are, more than 30 years later. Pretty much everyone who knows me calls me Leaf.
Book and books
I’m writing a book! I’m a graduate of The Book Academy, a book writing and publishing intensive offered by 4x New York Times best-selling author, Luvvie Ajayi Jones. It’s been an amazing experience.

If you want to follow along as I write, or just keep in touch, sign up for my mailing list below.
I’m an avid reader of leadership and technology books, feel free to check out my Goodreads.
Art

I’m also an Art-o-Mat artist. You can see more of my art here and even more at bouncingleaf.com.
Speaking
I was thrilled to speak at Enterprise Technology Leadership Summit, formerly DevOps Enterprise Summit, in Vegas 2024. You can catch that video here: Taming a Monster: Leading a Big Change as an Individual Contributor.
What an incredible conference and community! I’ll be there again in September, 2025. I’ll also be at LeadDev in NYC in October, 2025, perhaps speaking. Looking forward to both!
Miscellany
When I’m not behind a keyboard, I am often found walking, listening to an audio book, or watching birds. Someone asked me recently what I was watching lately to relax, and I said I was watching American Kestrels. Sounds like a cool Netflix series!
Je parle un peu de français, hablo un poco de español, vorbesc puțina românește, and m ap aprann kreyòl. You can find me on Duolingo.
The band They Might Be Giants wrote a song called “Jessica Roy” that is in fact in reference to me. I’m not sure it’s about me, exactly…