Who I am

 

I am a professional engineer, husband, father, and servant of Christ. Throughout my career I have worked to develop multiple types of expertise by working within multiple worldviews with developing a commitment to continuing education; diversity, generosity, and mentorship are core values of mine. 

​

Worldviews are influenced by when and where we have lived our lives and the degree to which we soak up and immerse in cultures. I have practiced my professional career in a range of domestic locations including Georgia, California, North Carolina, Iowa, and Florida. International experiences have increased my ability to perform independently; I have learned how other cultures deal with problem solving, decision making, business negotiations, and team consensus building. I have supported and completed engineering projects in China, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Ireland, France, and the United Arab Emirates. 

​

Continuous learning is a way of life driven by curiosity, not degrees on a wall. My curiosity has motivated me to complete multiple levels of corporate training, obtain a professional engineering licensure, become certified as a general contractor in multiple states, and to be an avid student of history and "how things work.”  My formal degrees include:

Georgia Tech - Bachelor's of Science in Civil & Environmental Engineering

Jacksonville University - Executive Masters of Business Administration

 

Diversity is not a corporate strategy, it is an attitude. People who have empathy and place value on the views of others find that diversity is an essential part of a contagious corporate culture. I value diversity above conventional performance metrics. The end result of a diversity first attitude is a winning team that accomplishes more. Men should be surrounded by women and women by men. The average skin-shade of a winning team should be some shade of tan or brown. This may sound challenging in a heavily STEM career field, however, commitment to diversity separates great teams from good teams.

​

Why I do this

My personality type is ENTP, Extroverted Intuitive Thinking Perceiving. ENTP's are a relatively rare personality type that is marked by the proclivity to solve complex problems (known as advanced pattern recognition) and the desire to act as a change agent within an organization (known as a champion of change). By combining formal engineering training with my personality I have the ability to deliver transformative innovation for companies and see a path to success in even the most complex projects, programs, and corporate initiatives. I have yet to be involved in a project within the last 10 years that hasn’t made a mark in people’s everyday lives and made the world a little better in the process.  A lot of people think I have the coolest job in the world, I tend to agree with them.

​

I strive to be a go-giver. At a corporate job I was trained in a business development process called "give to get.” The principles of the training were simple: your attitude should first be to "give" to your potential clients and then (and only then) could you expect to "get" new business from them. I totally agree with the principle with one exception - we should "give to give.” Giving should be a mentality that we wake up with and go to bed with; generosity and service are natural outputs from a giving mentality. If we live by the golden rule (do unto others, as you would have them do unto you) and believe in the goodness of humanity to pay-it-forward, then we do not need to expect anything in return for our giving. Givers will get their just reward.

 

I want to be a servant leader in the way that Christ was and I want to lift up even the lowest around me with love, compassion, and respect. I took a course called Servant Leadership when I was first learning how to be a middle manager. The title sounded cool, but it never really connected to me. I heard a trainer telling new managers that they should ask their team and subordinates "What can I do for you?", but I don't ever recall being asked that question by my superiors. Maybe they didn't get the training! Years later, as I was training to minister to middle-school and high-school youth, I took a course on servant leadership through the lens of Jesus Christ. It then hit me like a ton of bricks, the course I had taken years earlier was based on the actions and teachings of Christ, but the religious references had been scrubbed from the course to make it an acceptable secular teaching course. I want to lead with the heart of a servant every day.

 

Mentorship is a cornerstone of who I am as a professional. It is important to be a mentor and a mentee; I have professional mentors, but I also mentor many people of the next generation. Mentorship is interesting because there are many times when the mentor receives as much (or more) from the exchange as the mentee. Mentorship aids in keeping an attitude of humility and an attitude of gratitude. Mentorship reminds us that we did not make it all on our own and encourages us to mentor others to help them realize their dreams.

​