Postgres Woman of the Year July 2026 - Shalaka Dengale

Introduction:

Hi, I’m Shalaka — a Data Analytics Consultant at Amazon Web Services, where I work within the AWS Analytics team. I have over 9 years of experience in the data engineering field, specializing in building and optimizing large-scale data platforms using technologies like Amazon Redshift, AWS Glue, Amazon EMR, Step Functions, and serverless architectures.
In my current role, I help customers design, migrate, and modernize their data warehouses and data lakes on AWS. One of my key focus areas has been leading complex data migrations.

Journey in PostgreSQL`

My journey with PostgreSQL started through my work in data engineering, where I encountered it as the backbone of many enterprise data pipelines. At Amazon, it deepened as I began working extensively with Aurora PostgreSQL and RDS PostgreSQL, helping customers migrate from legacy systems like Teradata and Oracle to PostgreSQL-compatible engines. This hands-on experience naturally led me to the community — speaking at PgConf India and Postgres Bangalore events, sharing real-world learnings around migrations and cloud-native PostgreSQL architectures..

Can you share a pivotal moment or project in your PostgreSQL career that has been particularly meaningful to you?

One of the most meaningful projects was leading the migration of tables from a legacy Teradata system to a PostgreSQL-compatible engine on AWS for a major healthcare organization . I led an 8-member partner team, redesigned the architecture into a serverless framework, and handled 15 TB of historical data. What made it pivotal wasn’t just the technical complexity — it was seeing how PostgreSQL’s ecosystem on AWS could deliver enterprise-grade performance at scale, and it gave me real-world stories to bring back to the community at PgConf and pgblr. That project solidified my belief that PostgreSQL is ready for the most demanding enterprise workloads.

Contributions and Achievements:

While my contributions are more on the applied and community side rather than core PostgreSQL source code, I’m proud of the impact I’ve made in advancing PostgreSQL adoption and knowledge sharing:

Published 5 reusable solution patterns focused on PostgreSQL-compatible migrations — including patterns for migrating legacy data warehouses to Amazon Redshift, adopted by multiple teams.

Presented at PGConf India 2024 and PGConf 2025 — sharing real-world lessons on migrating enterprise workloads to PostgreSQL-compatible engines on AWS. My sessions reached 100 participants with a 4.9/5 CSAT rating.

Active speaker at Postgres Women and pgblr events, advocating for PostgreSQL adoption and helping bridge the gap between cloud-native architectures and the PostgreSQL ecosystem

(II)  Have you faced any challenges in your work with PostgreSQL, and how did you overcome them?

Yes, one of the biggest challenges was migrating 15 TB of legacy Teradata data to a PostgreSQL-compatible engine for a major healthcare organization — dealing with SQL incompatibilities like QUALIFY clauses and proprietary functions that had no direct PostgreSQL equivalents. I overcame this by building reusable conversion patterns and standardizing the translation approach with my team. Another challenge was handling sensitive PII fields securely in PostgreSQL environments, which I solved using encryption, secrets management, and mock data masking. I turned these challenges into community resources by presenting the learnings at PGConf 2024, PGConf 2025, and pgblr events.

Community Involvement:

I engage with the PostgreSQL community across multiple dimensions — as a speaker, mentor, content creator, and advocate.

(II) Can you share your experience with mentoring or supporting other women in the PostgreSQL ecosystem?

I actively speak at Postgres Women events to share my journey and make the space more accessible for women in the PostgreSQL ecosystem. I’ve mentored 15 participants in an exam booster program, many of whom were women looking to advance in data and cloud technologies, and I regularly guide newcomers on career paths and building confidence to speak at events. I also believe visibility matters — presenting at PGConf 2024, PGConf 2025, and pgblr as a woman leading enterprise-scale PostgreSQL migration sessions helps normalize women’s presence in these technical spaces. My philosophy is simple: lift as you climb.

Insights and Advice:

My advice is simple: start with the fundamentals — SQL, indexing, query optimization — and build confidence through hands-on projects rather than waiting to feel “ready.” Join communities like Postgres Women and pgblr early, because having a support network makes the journey less isolating and accelerates your growth. Don’t underestimate the power of visibility — write a blog, give a lightning talk, or present at a meetup; every small step builds your professional identity. And most importantly, lift as you climb — once you gain experience, reach back and help the next woman find her place in the PostgreSQL community.

(II)  Are there any resources (books, courses, forums) you’d recommend to someone looking to deepen their PostgreSQL knowledge?

I’d recommend the official PostgreSQL documentation (postgresql.org), joining communities like Postgres Women and pgblr for real-world learning, and most importantly — setting up your own instance and getting hands-on, because practice teaches you more than any book.

Looking Forward:

I’m most excited about PostgreSQL’s growing role in AI/ML workloads — extensions like pgvector are making PostgreSQL a viable vector database for generative AI applications, eliminating the need for separate specialized databases.

(II)  Do you have any upcoming projects or goals within the PostgreSQL community that you can share?

My goals are to publish more reusable patterns around PostgreSQL migrations for the broader community and to explore content around pgvector and AI/ML use cases with PostgreSQL, bridging data engineering with the evolving GenAI ecosystem.

Personal Reflection:

Being part of the PostgreSQL community means belonging to a space that values openness, collaboration, and continuous learning. It’s given me a platform to share my real-world experiences, learn from brilliant practitioners, and grow both technically and personally. Most importantly, it’s where I found my voice as a speaker and mentor — and it reminds me that technology is best when it’s built and shared together.

(II)  How do you balance your professional and personal life, especially in a field that is constantly evolving?

Honestly, it’s an ongoing practice rather than a perfect formula. I balance it by being intentional — I set boundaries around learning time rather than trying to chase every new technology at once. I focus on depth over breadth, picking areas like PostgreSQL migrations and cloud-native architectures that align with both my work and my community interests, so they reinforce each other rather than compete for time. Community events like pgblr and PGConf actually energize me — they don’t feel like extra work because they combine learning, networking, and giving back in one space. And I remind myself that rest and personal time aren’t a luxury — they’re what keep me creative and effective in a field that never stops evolving.

Message to the community

To the PostgreSQL community — thank you for being a space that values openness and collaboration. And to the women who are part of it or thinking about joining: you belong here. Don’t wait until you feel like an expert to contribute — your questions, your perspectives, and your experiences matter at every stage of your journey. Start small — attend a meetup, ask a question, write about something you learned. The PostgreSQL community is one of the most welcoming in tech, and every voice makes it stronger. And remember, you don’t have to do it alone — find your people at Postgres Women, pgblr, or PGConf, and lift each other as you grow. The world of databases needs more diverse voices shaping its future.