CAREER

Nearly fifty years, exploring.

I started on the factory floor at General Motors and ended up co-founding AI companies. In between: building products, running teams, launching brands, and getting to every major wave of digital technology early enough to help shape how it got used. The short version is the timeline on the home page. This is the longer record.

1977-1993

From kid hacker to corporate coder

In 1977, I learned how to hack into local mainframes — always to explore, never to destroy. I seemed to pick this kind of thing up pretty easily. By 1983, I was an adjunct instructor at Davenport University — one of their youngest ever. And in 1984, I got a job teaching GM factory workers how to use complex mainframe systems.

Code became my life. Well, code, along with wearing a tie, wingtips, and sitting in a fluorescent-lit cubicle every day. It was stifling. But in one gig, I inherited a cast-off Macintosh 512K. I taught myself to use it, and pretty quickly I became the company's de facto digital designer and courseware designer.

The change made me realize how much I enjoyed the puzzle of learning my way through new technologies, and then sharing them with others. It also made me realize that I wanted to be creative in my job — creating visuals and audio all day, rather than subroutines. So I went back to school to study film and video production. That started my second career: digital marketing.

1994-1999

"We don't need internet email. We have a perfectly good phone system and fax machine."

Designing early websites let me combine both creativity and software. So I helped some of the world's biggest consumer brands get online when most of their leadership didn't understand the Internet's potential. My Cincinnati team and I built the very first websites for P&G, RCA, Johnson & Johnson, and others.

Once people understood the potential, things got more complex. We built one of the first commercial AI systems on the consumer web — a prescriptive expert system for Kenwood, built with the University of Chicago. My Washington DC team built one of the first content management systems for the commercial web, and one of the earliest internal corporate social networks, both for MCI.

Then in LA, I got up on a stage in front of Ford's national dealer network to convince them to try e-commerce. They tried to boo me offstage. I convinced them that this new tech would help them save money and reach more customers. After 30 minutes of testing my persistence, communication skills, and deodorant, I walked away with their approval. Ford became the first auto dealer to put their inventory online.

The Ford dealer story → (coming this month)

2000-2018

Digital transformation — back when the phrase still meant something

Over nearly two decades, large corporations needed help automating their paper-based systems. As a digital specialist within some of the world's largest ad agencies, my job was to lead customers into new media, like digital advertising. Community engagement. Podcasting. Augmented reality.

In this business, my value was understanding every new technology so I could apply it to customer problems — and sell my agency's time to clients. I moved to London and got to do some amazing work, like writing one of the first serious pieces on cryptocurrency for InformationWeek. In 2014, my team and I launched a predictive AI earned media tool.

But something felt off. All of these tools were supposed to bring people together, empower them, and provide a win-win benefit for people and products. But they were getting twisted. Creepy. The promise of the early Web was getting hijacked.

By the time I started my final tour of corporate America, at Xerox, it became clear that digital transformation was moving in the wrong direction. It was time to get out of corporate America and do something to actually give back to the world.

The Performly story → (coming this month)

2018-2025

Built a tech company that actually shipped

So the day after I left Xerox, I founded Transparent Path — a logistics-tech firm using predictive AI and IoT to keep high-value and perishable goods cold, tracked, and safe during transport. An effort to stop epic levels of food waste. I built the team, raised capital, shipped products, sold in markets worldwide, and survived the gap between pilot and scale. Our trackers now keep cargo safe in uncertain, high-risk supply chains.

How me getting cut from Xerox turned into a success story → (coming this month)

Now

Teaching, speaking, board work, and building my digital twin

Still on the board of Transparent Path. Guest-lecturing and running workshops on applied AI. Building a better version of myself. And writing — mostly about AI, what it's good for. What it isn't. And who it should be working for.

AI and how it could better serve people → (coming this month)

Creating a version of yourself. What could go wrong? → (coming this month)

Selected Brands & Clients

I've advised more than 100 companies, across 18 verticals, over four decades. Here are a few.

Abbott Labs
Alaska Airlines
Government of Alberta (CA)
Amazon
American Institute of Architects
American Malls International
Apple Computer
BC Hydro (CA)
BMW US
Bowflex
Brita
Brown-Forman (UK)
The Clorox Company
De Beers (CA)
eBay
FedEx

Ford Motor Company
France Telecom
General Electric Appliance
Henry Ford Health System
Hewlett-Packard
Holland America Line
HTC Americas
IHOP Restaurants
Information Resources
Intel Corporation
Jack in the Box
Janssen Pharmaceuticals
Johnson & Johnson
Kenwood USA
KPMG
Level 3 Communications

Lincoln Motor Company
Litehouse Foods
Marine Harvest/MOWI (CA)
Mattel
The Mayo Clinic
Merck
MCI WorldCom
Microsoft
Nature's Path Organic (CA)
Nautilus
Nordstrom
Numi Tea
Procter & Gamble
Puget Sound Energy
RCA
Starbucks Coffee Company

Sun-Rype Foods (CA)
Swiss Re Insurance (CH)
Tempur-Sealy (UK)
T-Mobile USA
Travel Manitoba
UnionBay Sportswear
UPS
US Dept of Commerce
US Dept of Health & Human Services
US Postal Service
Volkswagen of America
WatchGuard Technologies

SOME CRAZY YEARS

1979

I was online gaming on PLATO and reading research papers on ARPANET - the precursor to the Internet.

1979