About Patrick
Technical documentation leadership grounded in product, people, and systems thinking.
English and French | Documentation, developer experience, and content operations
Professional Summary
I'm a technical documentation leader with more than 10 years of experience scaling content operations and leading distributed teams in global software organizations.
My work sits at the intersection of documentation strategy, developer experience, AI adoption, process transformation, and cross-functional collaboration with Engineering, Product, UX, Support, and Localization.
I care about documentation as a real product experience: accurate enough to earn trust, structured enough to help people move, and operationally healthy enough for teams to maintain over time.
Highlights
- Led documentation teams of 12+ people, including 2 team leads.
- Built and led Shopify technical writing teams responsible for developer documentation and API guides.
- Owned hiring for technical writing teams at Okta and Shopify.
- Improved shopify.dev documentation structure, navigation, and developer experience.
- Led evaluation and purchase of Acrolinx for documentation quality and governance.
- Expanded Shopify merchant documentation coverage to 10 languages in under six months.
- Taught docs-as-code, API documentation, coding fundamentals, and visual communication at Algonquin College.
Experience
A career across docs leadership, developer platforms, and education
Technical Writer Manager, Okta
Lead a distributed documentation organization spanning writers, editors, engineers, and team leads across Okta's documentation ecosystem.
Technical Writer Manager, Shopify
Built and led high-performing technical writing teams for Shopify developer documentation and API guides across a global commerce platform. Owned hiring, supported team development, improved shopify.dev documentation structure and user experience, and drove merchant documentation localization strategy.
Instructor, Algonquin College
Taught docs-as-code, coding fundamentals, API documentation, content strategy, and visual communication to technical writing students.
Technical Writer, Snow, formerly Embotics
Created and maintained Swagger and OpenAPI reference documentation, and partnered on technical video content for customer education.
Technical Writer, Qlik Canada
Used customer behavior insights and analytics to refine documentation guidelines and lead quality initiatives.
Technical Writer, Irdeto Canada
Documented internal SDKs and public REST APIs, translating complex technical concepts through close developer interviews.
Expertise
Tools, practices, and strengths
Documentation Leadership
Distributed team leadership, hiring, team development, operating models, standards, governance, and cross-functional planning.
Developer Documentation
REST, GraphQL, OpenAPI, SDKs, docs-as-code, Git, CI/CD, Markdown, MDX, HTML, and developer onboarding flows.
AI and Content Tools
ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Acrolinx, automation, quality checks, content consistency, and workflow transformation.
Knowledge Platforms
Atlassian, Zendesk, Guru, Jekyll, Middleman, Gatsby, DITA, MadCap Flare, Oxygen, and Adobe Technical Communication Suite.
Programming Familiarity
Python, Java, React, Ruby, Liquid, SQL, and enough engineering context to work closely with technical teams.
Design and Media
Visual communication, diagrams, charts, illustrations, Photoshop, Illustrator, Final Cut, and Adobe Premiere.
Education
Technical Writer post-graduate certificate
Algonquin College of Applied Arts and Technology, 2011
Honors B.A., Classical Studies and English
University of Ottawa, 2009
D.E.C. Liberal Arts
Heritage College, 2005
Let's connect
I am always happy to talk documentation leadership, developer experience, content operations, and technical writing teams.
Get In Touch