I help organizations turn customer insight into business outcomes by developing leaders, building scalable systems, and creating experiences people trust.
My career has spanned engineering, customer support, consulting, services, and UX leadership—giving me a unique perspective on how organizations create value and where customer experience breaks down.
Featured Impact Stories
My leadership work has focused on helping organizations scale through people, systems, learning, customer understanding, and strategic influence.
Professional Journey
My career has followed an unconventional path through engineering, customer support, services, operations, and user experience leadership. Each chapter provided a different perspective on how organizations create value and how customer experience influences business outcomes.
Chapter | What I Learned |
Engineering | How complex products are built |
Customer Support | How customers experience those products |
Consulting & Services | How organizations deliver value |
Leadership | How to develop people and scale teams |
Executive Design Leadership | How to align customer experience with business strategy |
Executive Manager, User Experience · Octave (2023–Present)
Lead a global team of designers and researchers supporting a diverse enterprise software portfolio. Responsible for experience strategy, design operations, research enablement, organizational effectiveness, and talent development.
UX Leadership · Hexagon (2022–2023)
Led user experience teams across multiple product lines while establishing organizational metrics, strategic planning processes, and research practices that strengthened the connection between customer insight and product decision-making.
Services & Operations Leadership · Intergraph / Hexagon (2007–2022)
Progressed through support, consulting, customer success, and technical leadership roles, ultimately leading distributed teams across North America. Managed customer engagements, service delivery, organizational operations, training programs, knowledge management systems, and strategic initiatives.
Engineering · Northrop Grumman (2003–2007)
Began my career as a systems engineer supporting advanced defense programs, developing a foundation in problem-solving, systems thinking, and technical leadership that continues to influence my approach today.
Leadership Philosophy
Build Great Teams
The best outcomes come from people who feel invested in their work and trusted to do it well. I build teams by recruiting for curiosity and character, creating clear paths for growth, and fostering the kind of psychological safety that lets people do their best thinking. A great team isn't a collection of individual contributors — it's an organism that makes each person stronger.
In my most recent role at Octave, I reduced voluntary attrition to 0% by building a culture grounded in engagement, candid feedback, and genuine investment in every team member's development.
One of the most rewarding parts of leadership is helping people grow into roles they once thought were beyond their reach. I measure success not only by what my teams accomplish, but by the leaders they become.
Align Around Outcomes
Design only creates value when it's connected to the things the business cares about. I build alignment by translating user insights into strategic language, establishing shared KPIs that bridge design and business goals, and making the invisible work of UX visible to executive stakeholders.
This means sitting at the table where decisions are made — not waiting to be invited — and speaking the language of outcomes, not just craft.
It also means getting out of the building. The most important thing a design leader can do is maintain frequent, direct contact with the people who actually use the software — not through dashboards and summaries alone, but through real conversations and observations. Every customer interaction surfaces something no internal meeting can. That discipline of continuous engagement keeps the work grounded and the strategy honest.
Create Systems That Scale
Individual effort doesn't scale. Systems do. Whether it's design operations infrastructure, research enablement tooling, quality management frameworks, or internal communication ecosystems, I focus on building the scaffolding that helps organizations learn, collaborate, and improve as they grow.
Throughout my career, I've established the rituals and channels that connect teams across products, functions, and geographies—including design critiques, craft sessions, showcases, town halls, newsletters, workshops, and knowledge-sharing repositories. Together, these form a knowledge-sharing ecosystem that continuously develops people, spreads insights, creates organizational memory, and aligns teams around both strategy and execution.
Good systems reduce friction, increase quality, and free people to focus on the work that only humans can do.
Community Leadership
Beyond my professional work, I've founded and led multiple community organizations, including a charitable nonprofit that raised more than $400,000 for local causes.
Hope House Foundation · Board of Directors (2017–Present)
As a board member of Hope House Foundation, a Norfolk nonprofit supporting adults with developmental disabilities, I help guide organizational strategy, fundraising, and community engagement efforts. Serving in leadership roles including Secretary and Chair of Marketing & Development has reinforced my belief that thoughtful application of technology and human-centered design can meaningfully improve people's lives.
Wards Corner Civic League · President (2017–2026)
For nearly a decade, I led one of Norfolk's largest civic leagues, representing residents in conversations with city leaders and helping shape the future of our neighborhood. The experience strengthened my ability to build consensus, navigate competing priorities, and turn community input into action.
Kickball League of Hampton Roads · Founder & Commissioner (2009–2025)
Recognizing an unmet demand for recreational and social opportunities for young professionals in Hampton Roads, I founded the Kickball League of Hampton Roads and grew it from six teams and 100 participants to nearly 100 teams and more than 1,700 players. Over seventeen years, I led every aspect of the organization—from strategy and operations to marketing, technology, and customer experience—while building a community that connected thousands of people across the region.
Education & Continuous Learning
Learning has been a constant throughout my career. I believe great leaders remain curious, continuously seeking new perspectives, skills, and ways to create value for the people they serve.
- M.HCI, Iowa State University (4.0)
- M.S., Modeling & Simulation, Old Dominion University
- B.S., Mechanical Engineering & Mathematics, Penn State University (Schreyer Honors)
Contact
Norfolk, VA
Technical Employment HistoryCommunity & Civic Leadership
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