About
I’ve been a digital craftsperson since middle school. I could never draw or paint, but discovering Adobe tools and HTML was a revelation. I made all manner of Star Wars parodies or custom MySpace pages with my friends during Nebraska summers around Y2K.
Professionally, I first applied those skills in advertising after graduating as a Cornhusker. I still enjoy video production, graphic design, and branding from time to time, but I soon realized my core love was leveraging technology to manifest my intent. I could see things as they “ought” to be and quickly learn the tools or techniques needed to make them real.
I built a freelance business as digital media generalist, gradually taking on more work on the web, and teaching myself the web technologies along the way.
Eventually a local startup took a chance on me as a product (UI/UX) designer. I’ve been in startups ever since. Over the last decade, I’ve helped all of them with design, some with management, a couple with 0-1 product work, and lead one through Series A and Series B growth.
If the proof is in the pudding, I’ve done well: Each company is still thriving today.
I’m rooted in Lincoln, Nebraska. I married my high school sweetheart and settled down less than 15 minutes from where I lived as a kid. We have three kids and two dogs. About the only thing I’ve ever felt “born” to do is be a dad. My work in startups is a way to fund that purpose.
I’m happy leading a pretty quiet, introverted life. Networking gives me anxiety, so I make fewer—but deeper—connections by just doing great work. When I work, I’m all-in: I have incredibly high expectations for anyone I work with, feel a moral obligation to ship our best work, and generally pursue excellence as an end in itself.
But, I suppose with the wisdom that comes after hustling and grinding a bit too hard—and somewhat paradoxically—I’ve also learned to embrace what Oliver Burkeman calls “Cosmic Insignificance Therapy”.
an invitation to face the truth about your irrelevance in the grand scheme of things… Truly doing justice to the astonishing gift of a few thousand weeks isn’t a matter of resolving to “do something remarkable” with them. In fact, it entails precisely the opposite: refusing to hold them to an abstract and overdemanding standard of remarkableness, against which they can only ever be found wanting, and taking them instead on their own terms, dropping back down from godlike fantasies of cosmic significance into the experience of life as it concretely, finitely—and often enough, marvelously—really is.
Sorry for the philosophical tangent. If you’re still reading, and resonating, let’s chat about working together!
