We’re thrilled to recognize Ashley Majar from Tel Aviv, Israel, as our MongoDB User Group Leader of the Month. Ashley has been leading the MUG Tel Aviv for a few years, growing it to over 1100 active members and creating an exceptional community for MongoDB developers in Tel Aviv, Israel.
As part of this recognition, we asked her a couple of questions about her journey. Keep reading to learn more about how amazing Ashley is 
Tell us about your journey as a MongoDB User Group leader.
I’ve been a developer since elementary school and started using MongoDB at 13, and it was my first database, back when the website still looked like it was from another era. I used it for personal projects, at work, and at my own startup. At one .local I casually attended, I met Pavel, a MongoDB employee, who mentioned they were looking for a community leader in Israel. I said yes, and we grew to 1k members in around a year and a half - with events drawing 150-200 people hosted at Microsoft, AWS, and beyond.
What has been your most rewarding moment as a MUG leader?
Watching non-programmers build real products with their knowledge and skills from the MUG. I know MUG members who don’t write code - they use AI to develop apps - and I introduced them to MongoDB because they don’t need to worry about schemas or migrations, they just start building. The other moment is walking into an event and seeing people already looking for the person they met last time - that’s when you know you’ve built an actual community and not just a mailing list with a meetup.
Do you have any tips for developers looking to build a community?
A newsletter with 1,000 subscribers is not a community. The same 1,000 people showing up to events, knowing each other by name, messaging in a WhatsApp group - that’s a community. Start with a WhatsApp group. Elevate the experience beyond pizza and three lectures - we do sushi, dim sum, workshops, and competitions. People remember the effort. Go hands-on: round tables and skill challenges beat passive lectures, especially now that AI delivers the knowledge part in seconds. And connect with other local events and the global MUG network - honestly, we could be doing this more, and I think there’s a lot of value sitting untapped between communities that never talk to each other.
What’s your favorite thing about being part of the MongoDB Community?
The global-local connection. I’ve been to MongoDB events in Amsterdam, Stockholm, and the annual conference, and I bring everything I learn straight back to Tel Aviv. The workshops, the use cases, the people - they shape what we build locally. That said, I think we as MUG leaders could collaborate a lot more globally - joint events, shared formats, even just sharing what’s working. We have the Slack and the Zoom calls, but there’s room to go deeper. Having that global network feeding a hyper-local group where people actually know each other is rare, and I want to lean into it more.
Where can developers connect with or learn more about you?
Want to catch Ashley at an upcoming event or connect with her? Use any of the channels: LinkedIn.
Thank you very much, Ashley, for sharing your story with us today and for all the incredible work you’ve done for the MongoDB Community. We can’t wait to see what you achieve next.