Aaron Buma

About Aaron Buma

Outside of work, I’m a reliability and \"go fast\" nerd in more ways than one. When I’m not optimizing cloud architecture or tuning databases, I’m spending time with my daughters, tackling projects in and around the house, or driving one of my two vehicles— yes, the Elise has a common reliable Toyota motor!(What can I say? I value uptime.) My daughter and I recently took up breadmaking—a little late for the lockdown craze, but better late than never!I’m a dog person, a fan of Northwest breweries, and a car enthusiast (ask me about my Lotus Elise). You’ll usually find me tinkering with tech, exploring the Pacific Northwest, or chasing a good view with a better beer.Industry: SAAS Solutions for Fire, EMS and Hospital in both the Private and Public sectors, including US DoD with Confidential clearance. PII/PHI, STIG and FedRamp experience. MS SQL Server:With over 15 years of experience, I specialize in architecting, performance tuning, and building maintainable SQL Server solutions across both VMs and Azure. I use a code-first approach and prefer automation and Infrastructure as Code (IAC)- and example was building a ETL from production into a Managed Instance that dynamically built low-impact queries, based on the MI schema, to only retrieve the latest data since the last pull. Myself and my small DBA team successfully inventoried, maintained, monitored over SQL databases on-prem and in the cloud (Azure SQL, SQL MIs and SQL VMs)- a SQL \"Bingo\"! I\'ve also had the privilege of speaking at community events like SQL PASS and SQL Saturday. Microsoft Azure:I bring 10+ years of hands-on experience working with Azure, from deploying and managing cloud resources to integrating them into enterprise-scale solutions. Leveraging infrastructure as code and Azure-based scripting automation to perform maintenance and monitoring.Cloud Cost Optimization:Over the past year, I’ve been laser-focused on cloud spend optimization—identifying overprovisioning, uncovering inefficiencies, and creating sustainable feedback loops for stakeholders to improve cost efficiency. I\'ve halted a rapidly increasing Azure spend and flattened the spend trajectory, resulting in nearly seven figures in annual savings. Most recently, I’ve been partnering across departments and levels to build out cloud cost efficiency and margin tracking at the product level.

Experience

1. Foundation Member

   Finops Foundation

   Apr 2025 — Present

Education

• Western Washington University

  Management Information Systems

  2003 — 2008

Skills

• Microsoft Sql Server
• User Stories
• R&D
• Html
• Software Engineering
• Php
• Product R&D
• T-Sql
• Software Development
• Scrum
• Asp
• Ssrs
• Inventory Management
• Sql
• Asp.net
• Web Development
• Highjump Software
• Saas
• Visual Studio
• Unmanned Vehicles
• Drones
• Global R&D
• Lean Thinking
• T-Sql Stored Procedures
• C#
• Transact-Sql (T-Sql)
• Product Development
• Databases
• Xml
• Agile Methodologies