Red Hat Inc. Principal Software Engineer Sally O’Malley has always been driven by a deep curiosity and an ability to connect the dots in unexpected ways. Her eclectic career path has shaped her into an innovative leader who thrives in environments that value adaptability and open-source collaboration — qualities at the core of Red Hat’s culture.

Sally O’Malley shares insights on Red Hat’s open-source AI innovations and the impact of collaboration on technology advancement.

O’Malley’s been central in expanding Red Hat’s open-source artificial intelligence solutions to a broader audience, which she also discussed with theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s livestreaming studio, during KubeCon + CloudNativeCon NA. Her work demonstrates that technical excellence and an unconventional career journey can go hand in hand.

“I wasn’t willing to settle for anything that felt like I had to be anything but exactly myself,” O’Malley said. “It’s not even an important thing to me: I’m incapable of fitting in somewhere where I can’t be myself, and Red Hat allows that.”

During an exclusive interview with SiliconANGLE Media, O’Malley talked about her unique career trajectory, passion for open-source collaboration and how Red Hat’s open-source innovations are helping shape the future of AI.

This feature is part of SiliconANGLE Media’s ongoing exploration of how diverse backgrounds and unique skill sets can drive innovation in the tech industry. (* Disclosure below.) 

From teacher to retailer to software engineer: O’Malley’s Journey to AI

O’Malley has made her mark at Red Hat by championing projects that embody the company’s commitment to open-source collaboration and technical excellence. Her ability to translate upstream innovation into enterprise-ready solutions has driven the adoption of cloud-native technologies. She has also contributed to integrating Kubernetes and Podman within Red Hat’s OpenShift platform, helping ensure these technologies remain scalable, secure and flexible to meet evolving customer needs.

“My first half of working at Red Hat, I was on various teams, working on Kubernetes, Docker, Linux and Podman,” she said. “Now I’m with the Emerging Technologies team, where I’m continuously changing projects based on what we see in the communities.”

O’Malley talks with theCUBE about moving Kubernetes AI solutions forward with collaboration and innovation.

Teaching prepared O’Malley to help her colleagues and customers navigate intricate technical challenges. Returning to Trader Joe’s strengthened her interpersonal skills, reinforcing her ability to engage with customers and colleagues.

“Teaching helps me explain things — break them down into concepts so everyone can digest them, which is really important in my role,” O’Malley explained. “Trader Joe’s prepared me in just as many ways as teaching. The company’s culture of teamwork and creativity mirrored what I later found at Red Hat.”

Her transition to tech began when she moved to Westford, Massachusetts, and discovered Red Hat’s engineering headquarters. Intrigued by its open-source philosophy, she decided to pursue a second bachelor’s degree in software engineering at the University of Massachusetts Lowell.

“I wanted to learn as much coding, as much software engineering, as I could,” O’Malley recalled. “I took every coding class in that curriculum — C, C++, data structures, algorithms [and] Linux — and I just fell in love with coding. From that program at UMass Lowell, I earned an internship at Red Hat.”

From containers to AI: Engineering Red Hat’s innovation path

O’Malley has made her mark at Red Hat by championing projects that embody the company’s commitment to open-source collaboration and technical excellence. Her ability to translate upstream innovation into enterprise-ready solutions has driven the adoption of cloud-native technologies. She has also contributed to integrating Kubernetes and Podman within Red Hat’s OpenShift platform, helping ensure these technologies remain scalable, secure and flexible to meet evolving customer needs.

“My first half of working at Red Hat, I was on various teams, working on Kubernetes, Docker, Linux and Podman,” she said. “Now I’m with the Emerging Technologies team, where I’m continuously changing projects based on what we see in the communities.”

Beyond containerization, O’Malley has contributed to Red Hat’s security initiatives by working on sigstore, a public service for signing and verifying software artifacts. Her efforts have strengthened Red Hat’s software supply chain security while staying true to the principles of open-source collaboration.

 “I helped develop Red Hat’s product, based on sigstore, Trusted Artifact Signer,” O’Malley said. “I’m also a volunteer site reliability engineer for sigstore’s public service.” 

Building on her experience with containerization, O’Malley co-created Red Hat’s AI Lab Recipes, a modular toolkit that accelerates AI adoption by reducing development complexity. These labs offer practical, easy-to-follow guides that help development teams integrate AI models into their workflows faster, helping companies reduce time-to-market for AI-powered solutions.

“AI Recipe Labs is really about making AI more approachable to non-data scientists,” O’Malley said. “It’s a powerful repository that allows anyone to get up and running with AI applications quickly.”

Red Hat’s ability to stay ahead of new developments is another key to its success, and O’Malley attributes this ability to the company’s active participation in the open-source ecosystem. Staying closely connected to upstream projects allows Red Hat to develop enterprise-ready solutions that meet evolving customer needs rapidly.

“Our success has encouraged others to join in with the open-source way,” O’Malley said. “I think because of us, open source has become the space where innovation can thrive and new technology is born.”

Red Hat’s recipe for success: Exceptional talent thrives in an inclusive culture

Red Hat’s open-source success is built on a culture that values adaptability and long-term growth, allowing employees to evolve alongside the constantly shifting tech field, according to O’Malley. This approach creates opportunities for people with eclectic skill sets to thrive within the company, fostering innovation and diversity while supporting Red Hat’s commitment to open-source collaboration and keeping it at the forefront of technological advancements. As a testament to this philosophy, O’Malley is one of this year’s recipients of Red Hat’s Paul Cormier Trailblazer Award (formerly the General H. Hugh Shelton Chairman’s Award), an internal award that celebrates Red Hatters who are leading the company into the future.

O’Malley chats with theCUBE about AI collaboration.

“I’m glad that Red Hat leadership and their hiring process looks outside the box,” O’Malley said. “They look past what school you went to, maybe even what you’ve studied, your work history. They can see a potential. They could see the spark in my eye that I loved what I was doing.”

This emphasis on recognizing potential has led to a diverse workforce and strong employee retention. Many Red Hat employees have been with the company for decades, bringing deep expertise that has become a cornerstone of Red Hat’s success.

“There are so many people that I work with at Red Hat that have been there practically since the dawn of the internet,” she said. “They literally built the internet. That’s really rare in the software industry. It’s what contributes to the stability and reliability of our products that we’re known for.”

Throughout O’Malley’s decade-long journey at Red Hat, she witnessed three chief executive officers at the helm. Despite their different leadership styles, each has upheld the core values that make Red Hat unique — collaboration, transparency and a commitment to employee growth.

“I’ve worked under the leadership of Jim Whitehurst, Paul Cormier and Matt Hicks, and each one of them is so different,” O’Malley said. “But each one has fostered and honored the Red Hat culture because they understand that our culture is our secret to success.”

Red Hat’s AI advantage: Open-source collaboration meets enterprise scale

Red Hat’s engagement with the open-source community has enabled it to stay ahead in the rapidly evolving AI ecosystem. By staying closely connected to innovation hubs, Red Hat ensures that its open-source collaboration continues to drive advancements in AI and hybrid cloud technologies, according to O’Malley.

“Our ability to pivot and adapt so quickly keeps everything exciting,” she said. “The software industry moves so fast. Being able to do that successfully is just so fun because you’re constantly learning and succeeding.”

Red Hat’s deep expertise in Kubernetes and hybrid cloud platforms provides a strong foundation for scaling AI technologies, O’Malley added. Its focus on hybrid infrastructure addresses the critical needs of enterprises that require on-premises and disconnected solutions while maintaining security and stability.

“As AI scales, what really excites me about working at Red Hat is how well-positioned we are,” O’Malley said. “Some of the original Kubernetes developers are or were Red Hatters. And we also have a dedication to hybrid platforms, which is what our customers need as they keep their data on-premise and disconnected.”

Red Hat’s collaboration with IBM Corp. on InstructLab empowers organizations to develop AI models tailored to their specific needs by distilling large frontier models with domain-specific data. This approach meets data residency and security needs while enabling AI-powered innovations across industries, O’Malley explained.

“When you pair InstructLab with open source (license, models, frontier models) — IBM has provided Granite, and we also have Llama 3 — it means that, literally, anyone can now create small, effective models,” she said. “This is what’s going to open the door for talking toasters to autonomous vehicles to advances in healthcare we couldn’t imagine a few years ago.”

Maintaining open-source collaboration is essential to ensuring AI technologies serve diverse societal needs, according to O’Malley. By engaging diverse communities, the company seeks to build technologies that address a wide range of societal needs and challenges.

“When anything, including AI, is controlled by a narrow, small group, it can become skewed, it can become biased … it perpetuates inequalities,” O’Malley said. “By keeping AI open and transparent, it’s going to serve everyone. It’s going to reflect the diversity of societies rather than the priorities of the select few, [such as] data scientists or companies that can afford to build and run the models.”

(* Disclosure: TheCUBE was a paid media partner for KubeCon + CloudNativeCon NA. Neither Red Hat Inc., the primary sponsor of theCUBE’s event coverage, nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: Sally O’Malley