Lynn Griffith

Oak Park, IL
hello@lynngriffith.me
lynngriffith.me
github.com/lynnbgriffith

Summary

Engineering leader with nearly a decade at Automattic shaping WordPress's developer platform — from leading the frontend infrastructure that powers the Gutenberg editor to directing a portfolio spanning Playground, Studio, core WordPress APIs, real-time collaboration, and WooCommerce. Deeply at home in open source CMS work; seeking a return to closer, hands-on engagement with a smaller team.

Experience

Director of Engineering

2023 – Present
Automattic
  • Lead 8 engineering teams (~47 people) building developer-platform APIs and tooling for WordPress — spanning open source WordPress core and Automattic's commercial products.
  • Team portfolio includes:
    • Playground — WebAssembly-based WordPress runtime — and Studio, the Playground-based WordPress desktop app.
    • Core WordPress APIs: Interactivity API, HTML API, and Block Bindings.
    • Real-time collaboration in the WordPress editor — launched on WordPress VIP in 2025 and slated for WordPress 7.0 (coming month).
    • The wordpress.org website and developer relations for WordPress.org and WordPress.com.
    • WooCommerce.com marketplace and hosting-oriented developer features for WordPress.com.

Engineering Lead, Frontend Platform

2018 – 2023
Automattic
  • Joined as an IC on the frontend platform team; promoted to lead within six months and grew the team from 4 to 12 engineers.
  • Owned JavaScript infrastructure across Automattic's WordPress work — including adoption and stewardship of React and related frameworks.
  • Maintained the @wordpress/components UI library and @wordpress/data, the client-side state and API-interaction layer powering the Gutenberg editor.

Lead Developer

2006 – 2018
Delta Systems Group — Columbia, MO
  • Led development at a small agency, shipping custom software for clients across industries.
  • Built a festival and volunteer management system originally developed for the True/False Film Festival that was later adopted by additional festivals.
  • Built the custom crowdfunding platform behind Glowforge's launch, which set a 30-day crowdfunding record at the time.
  • Developed and maintained the agency's open source projects, including Dewdrop (a WordPress plugin development framework) and Delta CLI (a deployment tool).