Ben Hankins logoBen Hankins

Ben Hankins

Solutions Engineer translating complex business challenges into scalable technical solutions. I help enterprise teams move from "what if" to production with confidence.

12+
Enterprise Clients
$10.1M
Deal Closed
70%
Close Rate
15+
Client Presentations
6+
Years Experience
85%
Faster Deployments

About Me

Solutions Engineer and infrastructure specialist helping enterprise customers solve complex cloud and platform challenges.

My journey

Started in web development, then moved into Solutions Engineering at IBM when I realized I preferred solving problems with customers, not just for them.

Served as technical advisor for 12+ enterprise clients including CenterPoint Energy, AT&T, Cencora, and Pepsi. Led technical delivery for CenterPoint's 11-month SAP RISE evaluation—designed automation that cut environment provisioning by 85%, which helped close the $10.1M deal and expanded into a multi-year engagement.

After proving I could drive deals, I went deeper on infrastructure (promoted to Cloud Infrastructure Engineer, then SRE contract at Prove AI). Most SEs hand off to implementation teams after the sale closes. I wanted to own the full stack—POC to production.

At Prove AI, led SOC 2 compliance from 34% to 100% while maintaining 99.9% uptime. Also mentored 8 Solutions Engineers at IBM—3 earned promotions, 2 received performance awards.

Founded Sproutflow Studio in late 2024 to apply SE methodology to small businesses. Built my portfolio site as proof-of-concept, which landed my first paying client. Side venture, but reinforces the consultative approach I bring to Solutions Engineering.

What drives me: solving real problems for real teams. POCs that prove feasibility, architecture that avoids expensive mistakes, automation that lets engineers ship confidently.

Ben Hankins cartoon avatar

Core Capabilities

Customer Engagement

Technical presentations, POC delivery, solution architecture, stakeholder management

5+ years95%

Cloud & Multi-Cloud

AWS, GCP, IBM Cloud - architecture, migration, optimization

6+ years90%

Container Platforms

Kubernetes, OpenShift, Docker, Helm, service mesh, microservices

5+ years95%

DevOps & Automation

Terraform, Ansible, CI/CD pipelines, GitOps, infrastructure-as-code

5+ years90%

Security & Compliance

IAM, RBAC, SOC 2, compliance frameworks, security controls

4+ years85%

Observability & SRE

Monitoring, logging, alerting, SLO/SLI design, incident response

4+ years85%

Professional Experience

Helping enterprise customers succeed through technical expertise, consultative problem-solving, and customer-focused solution delivery.

Prove AI logo

Site Reliability Engineer

Prove AI

Jan 2025 - Sept 2025
Remote
Contract role to deepen technical expertise
SOC 2: 34% → 100%
99.9% uptime maintained
80% faster deployments
AWSKubernetesTerraformGitHub ActionsHelmSOC 2+3
Tap to see details

Key Achievements

  • Drove SOC 2 Type II readiness from 34% → 100%, unblocking enterprise sales.
  • Maintained 99.9% uptime across 4 Kubernetes clusters and cut deployment times 80% with GitHub Actions.
  • Improved incident response 60% using focused observability dashboards (Vector, OpenSearch).
AWSKubernetesTerraformGitHub ActionsHelmSOC 2VectorOpenSearchPython

Founder & Technical Consultant

Sproutflow Studio

Nov 2024 - Present
New Orleans, LA
Side Business
5 clients served
100% on-time delivery
Measurable business outcomes
TypeScriptNext.jsReactSolutions EngineeringTechnical DiscoveryAccount Management+1
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Key Achievements

  • Operate technical consultancy serving 5 clients using enterprise SE practices.
  • Own full lifecycle: discovery, design, development (TypeScript/Next.js), delivery, and account management.
  • Delivered 100% on-time projects with measurable impact: 50% more leads, zero-to-launch delivery, and 30% acquisition growth.
TypeScriptNext.jsReactSolutions EngineeringTechnical DiscoveryAccount ManagementCustomer Success
IBM logo

Cloud Infrastructure Engineer

IBM

March 2022 - Aug 2024
Remote
$10.1M deal closed
12 enterprise clients
20+ environments deployed
Multi-cloudTerraformKubernetesGitOpsSolutions ArchitectureEnterprise Accounts+1
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Key Achievements

  • Built Terraform automation scaling SAP RISE environments 2 → 49, contributing to a $10.1M win.
  • Owned technical leadership across 12 enterprise accounts from discovery through expansion.
  • Delivered 20+ cloud environments, replacing manual work with Terraform and GitOps automation.
  • Supported SE teams with workshops and C-level architecture sessions to accelerate adoption.
Multi-cloudTerraformKubernetesGitOpsSolutions ArchitectureEnterprise AccountsCI/CD
IBM logo

Senior Solutions Engineer

IBM

Feb 2021 - Feb 2022
Austin, TX
Promoted after 14 months
70% close rate
40% faster POCs
Team mentorship
Pre-SalesTechnical LeadershipKubernetesOpenShiftArgo CDTekton+2
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Key Achievements

  • Achieved 70% POC close rate using reusable Kubernetes frameworks that cut time-to-value 40%.
  • Delivered workshops and technical presentations to C-level leaders across key industries.
  • Led enablement for 8 engineers, contributing to 3 promotions and 2 performance awards.
Pre-SalesTechnical LeadershipKubernetesOpenShiftArgo CDTektonTeam MentorshipCustomer Success
IBM logo

Solutions Engineer

IBM

Dec 2019 - Jan 2021
Austin, TX
Technical pre-sales
Full sales lifecycle
Promoted after 14 months
Pre-SalesTechnical ConsultationKubernetesOpenShiftGitOpsArgo CD+1
Tap to see details

Key Achievements

  • Promoted in 14 months for strong customer results, high win rates, and consistent technical delivery.
Pre-SalesTechnical ConsultationKubernetesOpenShiftGitOpsArgo CDCustomer Success

Web Developer

Kortivity

May 2019 - Dec 2019
Austin, TX
Full-stack development
Production deployment
SDLC ownership
Vue.jsChrome ExtensionJavaScriptFull-Stack
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Key Achievements

  • Built a Vue-based Chrome extension for recruiter workflows, owning the full SDLC.
  • Delivered production features currently used by Kortivity clients.
Vue.jsChrome ExtensionJavaScriptFull-Stack

Featured Projects

Real-world solutions I've architected, from infrastructure automation to platform engineering that powers production systems.

ci/cd
Featured

DevOps Studio

infrastructure

Automated VPC Deployment (CenterPoint)

infrastructure

Terraform Infra Platform (Prove AI)

Web Dev

Second Line Psychiatry

Web Dev

Nealy Event Decor

Web Dev

Sproutflow Studio Website

Web Dev

Personal Portfolio

cloud

Enterprise Cloud Delivery (IBM)

infrastructure

Terraform AWS Modules

automation

Python & Go SRE Utilities

cloud

AT&T Watsonx.ai Integration

ci/cd

Python PR Summary Bot

ci/cd

deployment-patterns

ci/cd

gcp-gke-gitops

ci/cd

mlops-sre-mini

automation

Platform Engineering Lab

infrastructure

Helm Charts

ci/cd

GitHub Action Templates

18
Total Projects
3
Production
8
Open Source
5
Client Work