Trevor McFarland
VP, Engineering at WillowTree- Claim this Profile
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Bio
LinkedIn User
It is not often that you meet professionals like Trevor. I consider Trevor one of the smartest, hard working, reliable and thought-provoking professionals I have ever had the pleasure to meet and work with. Trevor and I met 7 years ago, when my company partnered with Aol/Verizon Media. Trevor was part of the team involved in the initial negotiations and he was responsible for all the product and technical aspects of the partnership. Trevor was without doubt the key contributor to the success of the partnership, helping grow the business from nothing to well over $100 million in just a few years. His value was not only his product and technical expertise, but his rare ability to translate business and strategic needs into products that work. He was able to work entrepreneurially within Aol/Verizon Media, get resources allocated and consistently deliver product innovations that were invaluable to the business and its growth. Just as importantly, Trevor is fun to work with, with a great sense of humour. I highly, and unreservedly, recommend Trevor.
Joanne Kelly
I worked closely with Trevor for about ten years at AOL, primarily in connection with our search business. During that time, I came to rely on Trevor not only for his technical skills, which are exceptional, for his ability to see the larger business picture together with the many, many details within that larger picture and also, more importantly, to be able to explain it all to anyone, whether to an engineer, a business analyst, or an attorney. Very few people I have worked with are able to maintain both broad and detailed perspectives, even fewer to be able to communicate issues and potential solutions clearly, and Trevor is chief among those few. I counted on Trevor to be able to assist me in navigating the necessary technical details - how does this work, are we able to do such and such, how long will that take - and also to know how each and every aspect of our complex technology licensing deals would affect not only our products and services, but also our business performance and outlook. In particular, we worked very closely in negotiating a long-term strategic deal between AOL and Microsoft. Trevor's no-nonsense pragmatism helped us to think about whether our proposed business arrangement was workable and manageable in every respect, and to communicate that internally as well as to those with whom we were negotiating. His expertise and skills will be an asset to any company.
LinkedIn User
It is not often that you meet professionals like Trevor. I consider Trevor one of the smartest, hard working, reliable and thought-provoking professionals I have ever had the pleasure to meet and work with. Trevor and I met 7 years ago, when my company partnered with Aol/Verizon Media. Trevor was part of the team involved in the initial negotiations and he was responsible for all the product and technical aspects of the partnership. Trevor was without doubt the key contributor to the success of the partnership, helping grow the business from nothing to well over $100 million in just a few years. His value was not only his product and technical expertise, but his rare ability to translate business and strategic needs into products that work. He was able to work entrepreneurially within Aol/Verizon Media, get resources allocated and consistently deliver product innovations that were invaluable to the business and its growth. Just as importantly, Trevor is fun to work with, with a great sense of humour. I highly, and unreservedly, recommend Trevor.
Joanne Kelly
I worked closely with Trevor for about ten years at AOL, primarily in connection with our search business. During that time, I came to rely on Trevor not only for his technical skills, which are exceptional, for his ability to see the larger business picture together with the many, many details within that larger picture and also, more importantly, to be able to explain it all to anyone, whether to an engineer, a business analyst, or an attorney. Very few people I have worked with are able to maintain both broad and detailed perspectives, even fewer to be able to communicate issues and potential solutions clearly, and Trevor is chief among those few. I counted on Trevor to be able to assist me in navigating the necessary technical details - how does this work, are we able to do such and such, how long will that take - and also to know how each and every aspect of our complex technology licensing deals would affect not only our products and services, but also our business performance and outlook. In particular, we worked very closely in negotiating a long-term strategic deal between AOL and Microsoft. Trevor's no-nonsense pragmatism helped us to think about whether our proposed business arrangement was workable and manageable in every respect, and to communicate that internally as well as to those with whom we were negotiating. His expertise and skills will be an asset to any company.
LinkedIn User
It is not often that you meet professionals like Trevor. I consider Trevor one of the smartest, hard working, reliable and thought-provoking professionals I have ever had the pleasure to meet and work with. Trevor and I met 7 years ago, when my company partnered with Aol/Verizon Media. Trevor was part of the team involved in the initial negotiations and he was responsible for all the product and technical aspects of the partnership. Trevor was without doubt the key contributor to the success of the partnership, helping grow the business from nothing to well over $100 million in just a few years. His value was not only his product and technical expertise, but his rare ability to translate business and strategic needs into products that work. He was able to work entrepreneurially within Aol/Verizon Media, get resources allocated and consistently deliver product innovations that were invaluable to the business and its growth. Just as importantly, Trevor is fun to work with, with a great sense of humour. I highly, and unreservedly, recommend Trevor.
Joanne Kelly
I worked closely with Trevor for about ten years at AOL, primarily in connection with our search business. During that time, I came to rely on Trevor not only for his technical skills, which are exceptional, for his ability to see the larger business picture together with the many, many details within that larger picture and also, more importantly, to be able to explain it all to anyone, whether to an engineer, a business analyst, or an attorney. Very few people I have worked with are able to maintain both broad and detailed perspectives, even fewer to be able to communicate issues and potential solutions clearly, and Trevor is chief among those few. I counted on Trevor to be able to assist me in navigating the necessary technical details - how does this work, are we able to do such and such, how long will that take - and also to know how each and every aspect of our complex technology licensing deals would affect not only our products and services, but also our business performance and outlook. In particular, we worked very closely in negotiating a long-term strategic deal between AOL and Microsoft. Trevor's no-nonsense pragmatism helped us to think about whether our proposed business arrangement was workable and manageable in every respect, and to communicate that internally as well as to those with whom we were negotiating. His expertise and skills will be an asset to any company.
LinkedIn User
It is not often that you meet professionals like Trevor. I consider Trevor one of the smartest, hard working, reliable and thought-provoking professionals I have ever had the pleasure to meet and work with. Trevor and I met 7 years ago, when my company partnered with Aol/Verizon Media. Trevor was part of the team involved in the initial negotiations and he was responsible for all the product and technical aspects of the partnership. Trevor was without doubt the key contributor to the success of the partnership, helping grow the business from nothing to well over $100 million in just a few years. His value was not only his product and technical expertise, but his rare ability to translate business and strategic needs into products that work. He was able to work entrepreneurially within Aol/Verizon Media, get resources allocated and consistently deliver product innovations that were invaluable to the business and its growth. Just as importantly, Trevor is fun to work with, with a great sense of humour. I highly, and unreservedly, recommend Trevor.
Joanne Kelly
I worked closely with Trevor for about ten years at AOL, primarily in connection with our search business. During that time, I came to rely on Trevor not only for his technical skills, which are exceptional, for his ability to see the larger business picture together with the many, many details within that larger picture and also, more importantly, to be able to explain it all to anyone, whether to an engineer, a business analyst, or an attorney. Very few people I have worked with are able to maintain both broad and detailed perspectives, even fewer to be able to communicate issues and potential solutions clearly, and Trevor is chief among those few. I counted on Trevor to be able to assist me in navigating the necessary technical details - how does this work, are we able to do such and such, how long will that take - and also to know how each and every aspect of our complex technology licensing deals would affect not only our products and services, but also our business performance and outlook. In particular, we worked very closely in negotiating a long-term strategic deal between AOL and Microsoft. Trevor's no-nonsense pragmatism helped us to think about whether our proposed business arrangement was workable and manageable in every respect, and to communicate that internally as well as to those with whom we were negotiating. His expertise and skills will be an asset to any company.
Credentials
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Amazon Web Services Cloud Practitioner
Amazon Web Services (AWS)Feb, 2020- Nov, 2024
Experience
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WillowTree
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United States
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Software Development
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200 - 300 Employee
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VP, Engineering
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Apr 2022 - Present
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AOL
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United States
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Software Development
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700 & Above Employee
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VP, Search Products and Engineering
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Sep 2011 - Mar 2019
Led 50+ person multi-location org comprised of product, design, engineering, and data roles, providing consumers great search experiences while pivoting to profitable, adjacent opportunities.- Led successful migration of search platform from on-premise to public cloud, involving more than 1,500 hosts orchestrated over the course of nine months.- Drove partner search business to aggressive run rate via a relentless focus on feature iteration that led to improved margins and revenue growth.- Built platform to develop, market, and distribute engaging browser extensions to profitably grow search distribution.- Collaborated with Microsoft on improvements to Bing’s search services, earning recognition at their annual partner conference.- Drove multi-year agreement with Bing for search services, negotiating with prospective partners on deal terms and product requirements, and leading the migration through to successful switchover.- Architected a new search serving platform, allowing for the consolidation of numerous legacy platforms while enabling patented agile methods for instant updates of product configuration.- Addressed inefficiencies and inaccuracies in product testing with a novel solution that allowed for higher volume of A/B tests, with greater accuracy, and with less staff.- Selected to lead Ads and Search org through GDPR compliance, moving from initial impact model through requirements assessments and mitigation implementation.- Spearheaded iOS app for content search and discovery, using content classification, entity extraction and clustering on content from AOL and across the web.
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Director, Search Products
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Mar 2008 - Sep 2011
Ascended from responsibility for AOL Search consumer product in the US market to global product ownership for all consumer experiences and backend data services across web search and directory.- Owned frontend product roadmap, collaborating with design and dev to introduce search result functionality bespoke to the AOL user base.- Implemented numerous backend search services (e.g. related searches and autocomplete), leveraging usage data to empower new consumer facing features on search result pages.- Drove tech partnership with Google to enrich their partner search API with new capabilities for ads, universal search, and algorithmic results.
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Systems Architect
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Feb 2005 - Mar 2008
Technical point person for SEO optimization of AOL content, defined SEO optimization plan leading to deployment of best practices and strategic optimizations that produced sustained lift in organic referrals.
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Senior Technical Manager
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Mar 2001 - Feb 2005
Led technical management and architecture definition of the content management and publishing system that moved AOL's content to web based systems.
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Senior Software Engineer
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Mar 1997 - Mar 2001
Created web applications within Digital City for movie listings, dining guide, event listings, and yellow pages directory.
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Internet Apps Specialist
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May 1996 - Mar 1997
Developed web applications for job listings and calendaring.
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Education
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University of Virginia
Bachelor of Science - BS, Aerospace Engineering -
George Mason University - School of Business
Master of Science - MS, Technology Management