I was born in the Midwest.
That means I'll probably be too polite when we first meet, I'll tell you the truth when you ask me a question, and I'll likely talk too much once we get to know each other.
After leaving Chicago in 1998, I spent ten years in the Southwest, which turned out to be a lot like the Midwest, because Arizona and New Mexico are full of Chicagoans escaping the weather. It taught me to love the West's wide-open views and how much life there is in a desert that looks empty at first glance.
Then came twelve years in Los Angeles, and in 2020 we moved to Bend, Oregon, on the eastern slopes of the Cascades. We love the seasons, the time outdoors and the slower pace.
I started out as an engineer.
I designed lightweight mirrors for space telescopes and then the telescopes themselves. A few of the things I worked on flew on satellites.
After four years of that, I wanted a wider range than engineering allowed, so I spent the next ten years at RAND. I worked on projects ranging from a theory of modular design to changing the way the Army deployed soldiers to Iraq and Afghanistan. I also wrote two books, one on what mature technologies can teach us about emerging ones ↗ and one on how professionals prepare for surprise ↗. I still teach at the RAND School of Public Policy.
Since 2019 I've run my own advisory practice, and today that work happens through Spark & Compass ↗. See the work →
I have a life outside of work.
I look after my wife and daughters. I mountain bike in the summer and cross-country ski in the winter, and I play bass guitar and pinball on the weekends.
I try to make everything I build beautiful and elegant, including the frameworks and products I make for clients. For a few years I did that with a camera, and later with a sketchbook and watercolors:
