about me

tl;dr:

I'm currently on the hunt for my next job! If you know of a full time (32-40 hr/week) role where I can help architect a complex software system, explore how AI fits into an organization, or lead a team of nerds towards building an awesome product, please reach out to me on LinkedIn!

Most recently, I was the Chief Technology Officer of Bionic Giant where I led a team of high-quality engineers and product owners and built some bespoke web applications for large organizations like Microsoft and Medical Mutual of Ohio.

I'm a seasoned entrepreneur and technical co-founder who helps amazing people get their impactful organizations off the ground.

I enjoy figuring out how things work, making technology approachable & understandable to non-technical people, and doing whatever I can to help get something done (whether that's strategy, executing on a vision, or managing a team).

i've got some time, gimme the longer version.

Much like what Marge Simpsons thinks about potatoes, I just think technology is pretty neat.

Even when I couldn't understand how to do anything on it, I took any chance I could get to be on my family's DOS-powered PC. I made my first website in third grade (and still have source code from websites I created back in 1998). In middle school, I wrote games for the TI-83+ graphing calculator and maintained the internet's largest Ralph Wiggum fan website. I was one of only two kids in my grade who owned a Cybiko. I taught teachers in high school how to use proxy servers to get around our school's firewalls so they could check their own MySpaces during class.

That's not to say I was only a nerd... I played defensive end in football. I threw shotput in track. I loved intramural broomball. I was a drum major in the marching band. I acted and did tech for our school plays and musicals. I was in the National Honor Society. (I guess looking back on that list, maybe I was only a nerd?)

What drives me most in life is to chase the joy I get when I partner up with interesting people to do something cool.

I was lucky enough to get into the University of Minnesota and enter the computer engineering program. A physics midterm went so poorly for me, however, that it made me reconsider my path, opting to study journalism instead. I helped spin up a student-run television broadcast club. I joined a band comprised of professors and got to record an album while the university paid me. I trained for and completed my first marathon with a bunch of other students.

Instead of jumping right into the corporate life after college, I made the most of my journalism degree and worked as a freelance videographer. I ideated, scripted, recorded, edited, and distributed videos for organizations like Pepsi, the Minnesota Timberwolves, the National Academy of Television, and Fox Sports North. (I also did wedding videography which, uh, never again.)

Around the same time, I took a risk and started a custom mobile app consultancy with my friend from high school.

We spent the next ten years building a successful agency, collaborating on cool projects like building self-driving cars and making traffic stops more safe and equitable. In addition to our work with startups, we also built apps for Fortune 500 companies, where we could build software that scales and works great for millions of people.

After ten years of dealing with the ups and downs of owning an agency, I moved on from that partnership and joined up with another creative agency. I spent two years as their Chief Technology Officer, helping to support their growing software engineering team. Our main project was to help a large wellness plan administrator transition their crumbling legacy products into a single, modern Ruby on Rails stack.

While working at that agency, advancements in artificial intelligence made it approachable enough for an engineering dropout like me to figure out how it works. I now give talks and share my opinions on how to use these amazing tools to solve tough problems.

I'm currently on the hunt for my next full time job. I am looking for something 32-40 hours a week where I can help a small team solve their tough product and engineering problems. We'd be pursuing a mission which helps make people's lives better in a meaningful way, likely in the healthcare or climate space. If you know of someone who could use a big hearted nerd that loves tech and people, drop a line on LinkedIn!

okay, cool, that's pretty much all work stuff... what else do you do?

I'm taking advantage of my time off right now to spend as much quality time as possible with my wife and kids.

My wife and I have been married for ten years, and we have been on some incredible adventures together. Whether that's exploring Europe and North America, running marathons, singing karaoke, or just chilling on our patio, being with my wife is the part of my life I look forward to the most when I wake up every day.

I'm also digging the time I get to spend watching my kids grow up. My daughter is heading into third grade, and watching her learn about how the world works is such a treat. My son is a goofy, charismatic, witty little guy, and loves noodling on tough problems like his old man. Those two challenge me every single day to be a better person, and I am so grateful for them.

Outside of family time, I don't often get a whole lot of time to myself. I do quite enjoy going on walks. I used to be very into running, but now that I'm four meniscus surgeries in, I need to probably be more strategic about how I'm gonna use what's left of them. That being said, I just blew the tire on my bike and decided it was a sign to get back into running. I also enjoy doing HIIT workouts on Apple Fitness.

Other hobbies that I enjoy include playing the guitar, visiting all the breweries in the state, experimenting with LLMs like ChatGPT, learning how to solder and repair old electronics, listening to new music (I'm currently working my way through Apple Music's 100 Best Albums or listening to ekkstacy), watching TV with my wife (current faves include Game Changer, Thousandaires, and RuPaul's Drag Race All Stars), playing Retro Bowl for iOS, reading through my Instapaper queue, hanging out with lovely people, and podcasting.

colophon

Here are the tools I used to build this site:

• Ruby on Rails
• Visual Studio Code
• Linode
• Transmit
• 2020 M1 Mac mini and a 2019 Macbook Pro

My goal with this design was to make things as sustainable and fast as possible. There's very minimal Javascript being used on this site, and I also try hard to only use text and emojis instead of images.

This about page was last updated on 2024-07-05.