Currently located in Blacksburg, Virginia, I'm planning to relocate to Longmont, Colorado in a few months. I spent the last decade as the Head of IT and Security for two technology companies, and prior to that, I was the Chief Systems Architect and Senior Engineering Manager of the Cloud Office business unit at Rackspace.
Now I am a Fractional COO/CIO for small businesses with roughly 13-130 employees and having made at least $1M EBITDA. I have two degrees from Virginia Tech (Go Hokies), a Bachelor's in Computer Science and an MBA, and I'm a trained negotiator and conflict resolution expert.
I enjoy building teams, leadership coaching, digital transformation, and implementing security and compliance measures to keep technology companies out of trouble and scale their operations.
In my former life, I've been a DBA, full-stack web developer, back-end systems engineer, and security guru, almost exclusively to small- and medium-sized technology businesses. I now prefer hacking people and problems over bits and bytes, and am passionate about corporate culture and its role in fostering business growth in a positive and diverse way.
Fifteen years after I earned my BS in Computer Science I went back to school to earn my MBA, because I realized I could make a larger impact in the world and the companies I worked for within leadership rather than by typing at a keyboard. Since then I've spent far more time working on policies, processes, and team development than entering ever-changing keystrokes into Linux servers, but I understand the need for both.
I enjoy mentoring other engineers and leaders in order to coax them into being better humans, more of who they are than they might otherwise have realized.
I have always been a cheerleader, someone who groks the essence of who people are and what they can contribute. I spent twelve years as a Scout leader and twenty years as a father, and those two experiences have taught me more about leadership than my 30 years in the technology space. I love the process of dissecting small businesses into their unique problems and opportunities and developing a strategy to help them "grow up" in a world that is increasingly chaotic and threatening.
Yes, I would say that my current role as a Fractional Executive for small technology companies is exactly what I was aiming for when I first set foot on the Virginia Tech campus as a freshman. I want to help budding entrepreneurs realize their dreams, especially those who lack the business acumen or experience to take things to the next level.
Have you had a role model or mentor that has helped you on your journey? (If you feel comfortable, please share their name and how they helped you)
I have had several. The owner who nothing about technology, but knew how to treat his customers with respect and the utmost service. The CTO didn't know how to talk to people but understood the role his company and its technology could play in the success of his customers' businesses and their customers.
The boss who knew how to sell his products outwardly, but couldn't quite understand how to sell his vision to his own employees without a little help. The COO who managed to keep his company afloat even when his peers kept making decisions that caused the company to hemorrhage money and didn't understand why "building the business" was so important, and why compliance and security were key differentiators that couldn't be understated in this environment.
The general counsel demonstrated time and time again that sometimes doing what's right for the business means speaking up and saying difficult things to those leaders who can fire you at any minute. I learned valuable lessons from all of these individuals, and am doing what I can to pay that forward by helping other business leaders learn from those strengths and not make some of their mistakes.
How do you see the role of the technology leader evolving over the next 5 years?
These days, five years is a long time. AI is on the rise and this is going to exponentially disrupt the business world, in both directions. I believe our technology leaders need to adapt to a world where AI helps our attackers as well as our marketers, our finance people, our salespeople, and our engineers.
The most important quality for a technology leader today is adaptability because it will be hard to predict what will happen tomorrow in a world where AI and similar technologies are developing at such a rapid rate.
We are more connected, more automated, and more vulnerable every day than we were the day before, and the future will be in the hands of those technology leaders who clearly understand the rest of the business and the value they provide, and take steps to make sure they don't fall behind in this accelerating world.
Adaptability, communication, strategic thinking, entrepreneurship, curiosity, and vigilance. The ability to be a devil's advocate, to consider the risks associated with new technologies, and to transform those risks into opportunities for the business.
The ability to see strengths in the people on their teams, and the vision to apply those strengths in the right way to serve the business and the professional and personal growth of those employees.
The ability to effectively collaborate with all stakeholders, to bring to light opposing viewpoints and incentives and to strive for solutions which benefit all parties, whether internal or external to the organization. Communication and candor are key to these efforts.
I look forward to serving not only the needs of small- and medium-sized technology businesses but also non-profits and those organizations which have a larger vision than they have checkbooks. I am looking into serving on boards of companies that are taking on difficult causes and challenging missions that could better all of society.
I am a strong mental health, environmental, and diversity advocate, and I would love to apply my experience to those companies that are championing those initiatives. I'd be happy to serve as a COO, CIO, Chief of Staff, or Board Member for such organizations to help move our entire community forward.
Take the time to understand areas of the business outside of your own. Every department has its own incentives and initiatives and values different outcomes and missions. Listen to your team; they know more than their salaries, or even their years of experience, might lead you to believe.
Build a community of safety within your entire organization; be the leader your people are willing to talk to no matter how difficult the topic, or how personal. Trust is key. Keep current with all technological trends, and spend time thinking about how the future might impact the companies they serve.
Finally, no one wishes they worked more from their deathbeds; spend time with your loved ones and don't let any employer take advantage of you or the people on your teams.
"Be the leader your people are willing to talk to no matter how difficult the topic, or how personal."
Technology initiatives are measures in terms of business value and risk reduction. First, take the time to understand the incentives of other stakeholders, then express your technology projects in terms they can understand and appreciate.
These most often show up as either an improvement in business value (e.g., optimized operations, cost reductions, productivity improvements, sales opportunities, reduced headcount, strategic alignment) or risk reduction (e.g., compliance with laws/regulations, security improvements, threat prevention).
Remember that leaders of non-technical departments may be more influenced by business-speak than technical jargon, so make sure you understand their language and take the time to measure the metrics they are concerned with (e.g., costs, time, mistakes).
From 2019 to 2022 I was the Head of IT and Security for a company working on developing autonomous semi-trucks. Over almost three years, I built an entire organization from one Systems Administrator to an international team of seventeen IT and Security professionals throughout the US and Germany.
All this while opening five offices and two data-centers, growing the business over 5x from around 90 employees to over 600 employees, all while suffering Covid and its remote worker and supply chain issues. When I started with the company they had an office manager more or less responsible for IT, HR, and Facilities, and by the time I left all three departments were fully staffed and led by experienced Directors.
I worked intimately with our COO to build all of those departments from the ground up, despite technically only being responsible for IT and Security.
A big thank you to Korey Mercier from KM Innovations for sharing his journey to date.
If you would like to gain more perspective from Tech Leaders and CIOs you can read some of our other interviews here.