In the beginning…
In 1991 I was attending George Mason University just outside of Washington, DC. I was ending my semester as an Accounting major and hated every Accounting class I was in.
As I selected my courses for the upcoming semester I decided to take a computer programming class. That was the beginning of my love for technology
A spark…
My first course was programming in BASIC. Those first programs were certainly nothing to get excited about but when the program finally compiled and did what I intended it to do, I had experienced magic.
I was hooked.
I switched my major to Management Information Systems (MIS) and dove into programming and everything to do with computers. I cut my teeth on a bit of COBOL, then some Pascal, and ultimately C before jumping headfirst into C++ as it was the hot language at the time.
Living the life…
I graduated college and was hired into the illustrious Systems Engineer Development (SED) program at Electronic Data Systems (EDS). As part of the program, I began as a Business Associate. I was lucky enough to get to design and deploy Windows for Workgroups and Netware networks for the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS). We traveled across the country and were literally swapping typewriters for computers and teaching people how to use a mouse.
The SED program had 2 phases, learn the business then prove you had what it took. The second phase was known as Tech Training and was feared by all that attended. It was a 10 week fully immersive and rigorous test meant to weed out the poor performers. It was full of individual assignments and if you failed the coding tests, you were fired.
Not joking.
I was able to get through training and was offered the sought after position as a Teaching Assistant for the next class. I refused though because I wanted to start coding in production!
Amazing opportunities…
Over the next 14 years at EDS I was able to create amazing systems using an incredible array of technologies, including multi-modal biometrics, smart cards, RFID, PKI, etc. I continued coding with Java and C++ up to and including the initial release of .NET where I migrated my skills to C#.
Some time around 2007 I made the (poor?) decision to walk away from day-to-day coding and moved into solution architecture. After implementing one of the biggest federal smart card issuance systems in the United States while at EDS, I moved on to Booz Allen and Hamilton to work on the use of the cards for logical and physical access control. I was only there 10 months though as I wasn’t in the weeds deep enough and was itching to go back and get my hands dirty with actual implementations.
I then went to Unisys where I again got to use my architecture skills to design and implement a number of nationwide production systems.
Check out my career journey timeline for more information.
The saga continues…
Fast forward to today and I’m currently serving as the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) for a woman-owned small business in the Washington, D.C. area—Dignari.
I continue to stay engaged in emerging technologies and help our clients figure out what solutions actually work, how they might fit in their unique environment, and what needs to be done to implement them.
At the same time I’m trying to help a young company develop a technical culture that offers people unique opportunities, exposure to new technology, and collaboration with like-minded creators.
Oh, I’ve also rediscovered my love for coding and I try to spend a bit of time developing when I can. I recently spent a few hours on the weekend developing a simple website using Vue. The site tracks time-savings I’ve gained from implementing automation into some of my daily practices. You can check it out at botmylifeback.com.
Let’s do big things…
So, welcome to my website. If you are here you are probably a lot like me and your love for technology is strong.
One of the reasons I chose a career in technology is the fact that I’m constantly learning. On this blog I share my thoughts and insights on emerging technologies across the spectrum. What you’ll find is that I’m more of a generalist than a specialist—mostly because there are simply too many things I’m interested in.
I also love to explore online business and have done some blogging, social media marketing, and podcasting in the past including some writing for Entrepreneur.com.
In the end, I try to share my journey exploring innovative technology and creative entrepreneurship in order to hopefully make your journey just a little bit easier.
Feel free to reach out and get in touch with me. I’m always looking to learn from others and help however I can.