David LoderTechnology Professional

04Support

The infrastructure side of the job

Fleet deployment, identity and endpoint configuration, runbooks nobody had written yet, and several years of being the person who shows up at the house.

  • Windows 11 imaging
  • Microsoft Entra ID
  • Microsoft 365
  • Google Workspace
  • TrueNAS
  • Linux
  • DNS / DHCP / VPN
  • Runbook documentation

Deployment

Thirty-two laptops, one repeatable build

At Mitzvah Circle I provisioned, imaged and deployed 32 Windows 11 machines for staff and interns, standardizing the software build and defining the readiness checks that ran before each one shipped — OS build, application install, Office activation, identity configuration. A standard build is worth the setup time because the fifteenth machine takes twenty minutes instead of an afternoon, and because someone else can follow it without asking me.

Identity

Making a fleet behave the same way twice

Microsoft Entra ID, Microsoft 365 and Google Credential Provider for Windows, configured so sign-in and device management behaved the same way on every machine instead of varying laptop to laptop. I wrote the support runbooks and trained staff on them, which is what brought the repeat tickets down. Before that the answers only existed in my head.

Self-hosted

A home lab that exists to be broken

I run a TrueNAS lab hosting containerized applications behind a reverse proxy, with storage pools, backups and internal DNS I manage myself. It isn't really a portfolio piece. Most of what I know about reverse proxies, certificate renewal and internal DNS comes from this thing breaking on a weekday evening with nobody else around to fix it.

In the field

Diagnosis, in actual homes

Four years with Geek Squad across computers, displays, printers, routers and smart devices, both in a high-volume service environment and on in-home calls. Most of it is reproducing a fault from an incomplete description, isolating the component that's actually failing rather than the one that looks guilty, and verifying the fix before the device goes back to the customer. I run appointments end to end, document resolutions in the service system, and train new agents on escalation procedure.

What it taught me

Translating without condescending

Explaining a router problem to someone in their living room uses the same skill as explaining state management to a first-year. You find something they already understand and build onto it. I try to write runbooks the same way.

Where I've done this

  • May 2025 — June 2026

    IT Support & Deployment Intern

    Mitzvah Circle Foundation

    I provisioned, imaged and deployed 32 Windows 11 laptops for staff and interns, standardizing the software build and the readiness checks that ran before each machine shipped — OS build, application install, Office activation, identity configuration. I configured Microsoft Entra ID, Microsoft 365 and Google Credential Provider for Windows so sign-in and device management behaved consistently across the fleet, then wrote repeatable support runbooks and trained staff on them. That brought the repeat tickets down and shortened onboarding for new staff.

  • November 2021 — Present

    Consumer Electronics Agent

    Best Buy — Geek Squad

    I diagnose and resolve hardware, operating system and home networking faults across computers, displays, printers, routers and smart devices — both in a high-volume service environment and in customers' homes. A lot of it is reproducing a fault from an incomplete description, isolating the component that's failing rather than the one that looks guilty, and verifying the fix before the device goes back. On in-home calls I install and configure home theater and networking equipment and run the appointment end to end, including scheduling, follow-up and Geekmobile inventory. I document resolutions in the service system and train new agents on standard service and escalation procedure.

  • May 2021 — November 2021

    Data Entry Associate

    Lenegan Plumbing

    Maintained water meter records for municipal contract work, verifying data accuracy between field reports and internal records. I also contributed to the early development of an internal application for collecting that meter data.

Full work history

Work that shows it

Personal·2023

Home Lab

A TrueNAS self-hosted services environment behind a reverse proxy, with storage pools, backups and internal DNS.

  • TrueNAS
  • Docker
  • Linux
  • Reverse proxies
  • DNS

Every project