About Me
I thrive on helping people - and in my line of work this ends up being the end user whom I advocate for. I tend to view solutions that are more of an "And" than an "Or", and approach problems holistically with a primary goal of understanding reasoning of the end user (and/or business reason, as applicable).
But that is about as far as my brand of optimism goes - I'm very analytical (almost to a fault), and - perhaps out of sheer stubborness - don't give up on solving problems once determined to figure them out.
Perhaps my best asset is in growth-based mindset. I love learning new things all the time - improving the way I interact with others and learning about behavior, emotions and motivations. I have mostly worked in only two organizations throughout my thirteen year career, I've never stayed on the same job for more than a couple of years, often drastically changing my focus to new technologies and/or new stakeholders. As a result of this I've gained a lot of varied experience - from very large production oracle environments, to smaller workflow internal applications. Throughout, my best work has remained on helping others with their work.
Things I love to learn about
Some subjects really fascinate me and ultimately, I'd love for my work to somehow impact:- Learning about what motivates people, how emotions work and influence behavior (and vice-versa)
- Pretty much anything relating to cognitive science or neuroscience
- Developmental disorders - especially Autism and ADHD - and the use of technology/games for developing affect and ease learning - so much that I wrote a dissertation about this subject
- The technology in our daily lives - things like nutrition, fitness, health, learning, entertainment, etc.
Other things that I like to do in my free time
- Craft beer, visiting breweries
- Various house projects - especially decorating, browsing pinterest or ikeahackers for inspiration
- Biking/Cycling (but not at the same time as craft beer)
- Runnning (and some 5ks)
- Yoga
- Playing board games with friends, especially Dominion :-)
- Playing games on iPad. I used to do video games a lot more heavily but the Angry Birds, etc. are so addictive!
- Playing bass guitar or piano. I've been in a few bands in the Chicago-land area - Ballistic Edna, Livid Vivian and Burnside Bridge
- Creating/designing chainmail and other metal jewelry