Hi there!

As a kid, I wanted to be an engineer. When the rovers went up to Mars in the late '90s, I was sold—I was going to be an aerospace engineer.

I was firmly headed down that path until mid-way through fall of my sophomore year of college. Something changed in me—at the time, I didn't know what, but I knew I was not where I was meant to be.

I scoured through the two-inch thick course catalogue, expecting the right thing to announce itself from its pages. Yet after months of soul-searching, I still felt undecided. Communications seemed interesting enough to at least minor in, so I jumped into that.

That decision would come to change everything.

I would pour myself into studies and experiences that taught me about how people and organizations think and behave and how people come together to create real and lasting impact.

I would uncover my passion and talent for building systems and teams that create transformation through purpose and connection.

I embraced a journey of challenge and support from peers, mentors, and advisors that revealed my personal purpose and passion to solve difficult problems that make a real difference for people in the world.

I had an incredibly transformational undergraduate experience, and I wanted to equip and enable others to have that for themselves. So, I set on a path to become a Student Affairs professional, which essentially required that I go to graduate school.

In my higher education graduate program, there was an opportunity to add another masters in human resource management from the business school. I reluctantly added a third year of graduate school, but looking back, that was one of the most consequential decisions to uncovering my calling.

Those two programs together revealed to me that I am a person who is both highly aspirational and highly practical. For me, it's not enough to have great ideas about what the world can be. We must also steward those ideas through teams and with discipline and focus.

My graduate experience would shift my my focus from "what" to "why"—from being a member of a specific profession to being fueled by a mission to work with other passionate and talented people to solve difficult problems that make meaningful results for real people.

Fueled by this sense of purpose, I would dive deep into work I probably had no business doing as a mid- to late-20s professional, but I did it anyway, and loved it and excelled at it.

I was lucky to find organizations—with leaders, managers, and peers—that supported, challenged, and empowered me to make the biggest possible difference I could make.

Having seen the power of that experience first hand, it became my mission to create that for as many people as I could throughout my career and life.

About five years into my formal career—all with the same not-for-profit company—I decided it was time for a change.

Initially, my search was all over the place and going no where.

I had spent the past 5-10 years doing product management, change management, project management, consulting, and account management. I was looking for roles where I could do all of that, but those were few and far between, and corporate recruiters were wary of whether my background would translate to their environment.

That's when I got the advice to focus on a specific niche and go at it aggressively.

Of all the paths in front of me, I picked change management, because I loved the idea that organizations don't evolve unless the people in them choose to change in ways that work for them and the organization.

Once I niched down, I quickly landed a role as a change lead at a large corporate company. Early on I loved it, but I would soon come to realize—just as I had with my major during my college years—that I wasn't exactly where I was meant to be.

When I started in my role, it was quickly apparent that our technology and processes—spreadsheets and powerpoints—were not adequate for the magnitude of changes we were managing.

I immediately got to work creating and deploying new apps and methods for managing our work. I was so exciting to build my own product and solve a real (and rather large) problem and enable hundreds of people to level-up their impact.

That's when I realized that my true work passion was working in product and technology.

I love take crazy, huge, ambitious ideas about what the world can be and turn them into real things that move people and ideas forward.

Product is a discipline of curiosity, discovery, and problem solving. Of trial and error. Of persisting and overcoming to reach an not-yet-existant future through an uncharted path.

I loved how product brings out both a spirit of adventure and a focus on utility and value.
It aligned perfectly with my personal emphasis on aspiration and practicality.

And when the opportunity emerged, I pivoted back to it and never looked back.

In 2015, I said (somewhat arrogantly) "In 10-15 years, I'm going to be the COO of a small- to mid-sized products and services company."

I did not envision that goal because I wanted to be "in charge."

I aspired to that goal, because I love equipping and enabling teams of smart, talented, and hard working people to do remarkable things in cohesive and empowering ways.

Today, I'm much closer to that goal (and its admittedly arbitrary timeline) than I expected I would be, but my focus has shifted somewhat.

I started b26n, in part, so that I could rather than making an impact in just one company, I can amplify the impact of many leaders across many organizations and ideas.

When I was a teenager, I wanted to create a world where everyone could wake up feeling valued by their employer and that they had the greatest chance possible to bring their best self to do their best work.

Back then, I didn't realize just how many people 7 (now 8) billion people are, but now, I don't care. I will always work to make that dream a reality for as many people as possible—and I'm excited to work with others who share in that cause.