I’m a software consultant and developer.
As an Accelerator Manager at Atomic Object, I recruit, hire, and manage cohorts of new software developers and interns. I help manage the Grand Rapids office. I advocate for a strong culture of feedback and transparency. I build and maintain relationships with schools and community organizations. I sit on a couple of advisory councils. I sell projects and maintain customer relationships. I market and run our student hackathon, Atomic Games. I build and maintain internal applications. I manage our corporate sponsorships and internal recognition program. I work with clients to rapidly solve business challenges and set up development teams for success.
As a Software Consultant at Atomic Object, I worked with clients to identify requirements, develop features, and manage project scope on an ongoing basis. I worked with stakeholders to choose the right tech stack to meet project goals and provide for ongoing growth without stretching the budget. I worked with small teams to manage time, scope, and budget requirements and deliver high quality software on time and under budget. I spent about a decade building mobile and web apps using Blitz.js, Next.js, React, Ember.js, React Native, Swift, Objective-C, Java, C#, Ruby, Python, TypeScript, JavaScript, Clojure, and PHP (among others). I deployed them to Heroku, AWS (as containers, serverless functions and VPS images), Google Cloud, and plain old Linux servers using tools like Make, Terraform, CloudFormation, SAM, and good old fashioned Unix knowhow.
As a Web Developer at Covenant Eyes, I joined an in-progress effort to rewrite an aging PHP app. I worked with a small team of designers and developers to build a new customer account portal in Python with Django to replace a homegrown PHP MVC. It was a generalist team effort, and we all worked at every level of the web stack. I built JavaScript form validation, HTML templates, Python request handlers, Django WSGI configs, and project Makefiles.
As a Product Developer at Covenant Eyes, I worked with a small API team to break down another spaghetti legacy PHP data submission interface into meaningful, testable pieces while simultaneously working with clients of the PHP API to design and implement a more suitable HTTP interface handled by Python with Django. We deployed the app to a small fleet of virtual servers. It’s been widely adopted and well received.
I dabble in graphic design and home automation. I’m rubbish at Haskell. I helped build Ziptastic!.
In my work with Atomic Object, I speak about the intersection of technology and business. I advocate for the use of great tools. I regularly lead internal and external demos, panel discussions, retrospectives, and planning meetings. I write for our blog, Spin. I lead workshops, brownbags, book clubs, and game lunches.
At Covenant Eyes, I prepared and delivered product release presentations for some of our web apps, native tools, and APIs. I served as the MC or facilitator for Christmas parties, launch parties, and R&D sessions. I've given talks on Redis, HBase, Clojure, PostgresSQL, React Native, MindNode, Obsidian, agile, imposter syndrome, and git. I taught User Experience practitioners about the inner workings of the web and brought them from “What’s a CSS?” to “What’s a good rule of thumb for choosing breakpoints?”.
In my spare time, I ride a bicycle and a horse (usually not at the same time), hike, cook, play indie video games, read voraciously, fly a jetpack, and hang out with my lovely wife Ashley and our dog.
I volunteer with local organizations to help train the next generation of developers. Occasionally, I answer questions on StackOverflow.
In the past, I volunteered at a local homeschool co-op, teaching highschool students about policy debate, algebra, and chemistry. I taught public speaking and forensics to Moot Court students at my alma mater, SVSU (B.S. in Computer Science, 2013). I was an audio engineer for a band. I was a studio engineer for Michigan Golf Live. I worked in construction for a bit. I grew up on a farm as a 4-H kid.
