Our Community Champion Program has always been about recognizing individuals who consistently show up to support others, share their expertise, and strengthen the Databricks Community. Alongside our customers, we’re equally proud to recognize the incredible contributions of our Bricksters, whose impact and dedication continue to elevate the experience for everyone. 

This month, we’re excited to spotlight  Emma Stowell @emma_s  as our Community Champion for July 2026 —

Here’s more about Emma in her own words —

Tell us your story: How did your journey with Databricks and the Community begin?

I've been in data and analytics for over 20 years. Most recently, I was Chief Data Officer, where we were implementing Databricks to help drive organizational change. That's where I first discovered the platform. I later joined Databricks myself as a Solutions Architect. To upskill quickly and get exposure to the full range of problems our customers face, I turned to the Community, answering and researching questions there helped me learn faster while also helping customers along the way.

What sparks your passion? What drives you to keep helping others, sharing knowledge, or solving tough questions here?

Two things: helping others and learning. Answering questions on Community pushes me to research problems and get to know our platform more deeply. There's real satisfaction in seeing someone get unstuck because of something I helped with.

Signature move: Is there a particular topic, technology, or style of contribution that people know you for?

My background spans a wide range of data work, so I'm equally at home in the technical weeds, things like data engineering and warehouse optimization, as I am at the strategic level: how to structure your catalogs, what data quality strategy makes sense for your organization, and so on.

A moment that mattered: Can you share one community interaction or success story that truly stayed with you?

It's less about one single standout moment and more about the cumulative feeling. Someone coming back to say "that's awesome, you helped me get unstuck" never gets old. I also really value the broader sense of community itself, including through our internal Community Champions program.

Behind the scenes: How do you find time to contribute alongside your professional work? Are there any rituals, habits, or motivational hacks?

I set myself goals, a target number of answers per week or month. There's also some healthy internal competition among us at Databricks that keeps me engaged. I'm still trying to keep up with Ashwin's answer count.

Learning in action

Community keeps me close to real customer pain points. It builds empathy, helps me spot gaps in our documentation that I can flag internally, and reminds me that things are rarely as simple as they look on paper.

Tech inspiration

Semantic layers. I've been a fan of these for a long time, and they matter even more now with agents and AI raising the stakes on having solid business definitions and documentation. That connects directly to removing technical barriers to data, like text-to-SQL, anything that helps everyday people access data and make better decisions in their jobs.

Human side of data

If you're the only data person in your team or organization, it can be isolating. Even AI tooling doesn't always have the answer, and the docs don't always help either. Having a community to turn to fills that gap and gives people somewhere to go when they're stuck.

Off the keyboard

I travel in my camper van. I've been all over Europe and the UK in it. I also ran a wine business for a while, so I love visiting vineyards and trying new wines.

Words to future changemakers

It's tempting to use AI to structure your answers, but remember it's not always right. It's often obvious too when someone's written a big paragraph with AI, so try to resist. Writing it yourself will help you actually understand the concepts you're explaining.

The Community Team would like to thank you, @emma_s  for your continued contributions and for showing what it truly means to support and grow alongside the community.