Alexandra Markello (she/her)

Alex is a Solutions Architect Manager on the Social Safety Net team, helping state governments devise technical solutions to improve access to benefits programs. Her career has straddled the technical & business spaces. She began as a Cyber Operations Officer in the Air Force, managing a large team supporting real-time intelligence operations. She moved to IBM first as a Software Engineer modernizing a legacy product, and then as a Global Operations Manager for the Blockchain and Cloud Garage teams, working on a new-to-market product and in a consulting org for rapid development/deployment of apps. She founded a small retail business – a virtual reality arcade – which she later sold, and she’s spent her recent years consulting as a Solutions Architect for clients in a variety of industries. She has a BS in Computer Science from Cornell University and MS in Computer Info Systems from Boston University. Alex loves hiking & exploring nature, traveling, curling up with a good book, and volunteering with Team Rubicon, a disaster response organization. She currently lives in North Carolina with her family.