I build and manage products for the web, as well as the teams and processes that effectively deliver them.
I've earned a reputation as a product-focused engineering leader and a technically-minded product leader. I have a passion for building teams and solutions that drive growth and delight customers. By addressing complex technical and business challenges with a data-driven approach, I consistently execute successful outcomes. I am passionate about shipping early and often, staying close to customer feedback, and maintaining individual contributorship.
Around 2012 I began to specialize in front end development and hone my web building and problem solving skills. I built and shipped a few dozen websites and created various open source projects. I later came to specialize in analytics and animations, which allowed me to work on varied and interesting projects.
As my engineering skills matured I got into the deeper complexities of application development by contributing to more established front-end teams. Eventually that worked out so well, that I was asked to manage and lead a front-end application development team. At the time of my resignation I was told that “I was running the top performing software team in the company.” Achieving this level of maturity and operational efficiency was challenging work, but once things were humming along – besides a bit of constant gardening – there wasn't much challenge left for me to conquer. Helping others grow their careers is and will always feel deeply rewarding, but I was ready to keep pushing myself to further grow my skills.
I have a propensity in my life to “always be shipping,” and spending three years in the Product Management space at Pendo gave me the experience to make moving into product management an easy and natural move. PM allowed me to affect change at a company in a very meaningful way, and while I wasn't directly coding features I greater visibility into strategy and positioning.
That, however, did not last long as it took less than two years before I had the itch to get back into a more technically-leaning challenge.
Today I'm a Senior Software Engineer at BENlabs on the Aritificial Intelligence as a Service team. I get to work on experiments that help deliver advanced artificial intelligence resources to customers in delightfully user-friendly solutions. As a bonus, I get to do it all while getting play with new and emerging technologies.
This is where I share my thoughts, code, and projects with the internet. I am a multidisciplinarian, lifelong student, and hobby collector. I am a tinkerer, a huge nerd, and a forever curious learner. I am a dog person, an outgoing introvert, a coffee lover, but best of all a happy husband & dad.
I've had various nicknames; from them the ones I've worn most proudly are "Moogle" and "Mikepedia." Sure they're silly portmanteaus, but they're special to me as they speak to what I feel is my true nature: to be unwaveringly curious with an intense desire for understanding.
I enjoy playing and creating music almost as much as I do consuming it. I am an avid music collector and love to discover new places through my ears. I attempt to play guitar and ukulele as often as possible, and find them to be wonderful debugging activities.
I love to cook and bake, and I'm obsessed with baking bread. I appreciate how simple the ingredients list is, and how success comes down to precision, technique, and patience. My current obsession is a 6-strand braided challah, which makes a killer french toast.
I'm a gamer (as evidenced by some of my projects) and my favorites are usually driven by solid storytelling or novel gameplay. Gaming also creates opportunities for me to stay connected with my distributed friends – regardless of where we live.
I love photography, and bring out my "big camera" as often as I possibly can, though I'm usually shooting on my iPhone 14 Pro Max these days. My little one and dogs are my favorite subjects. 🧒 🦄 🐴
I've been a developer in some capacity for a good while now, and I love writing code – especially from a state of flow – to express my ideas to the internet. Developing with a solid plan, strong coffee, and good music is my quiet happy place.
I enjoy working on home projects around the house. I'm not being invited to This Old House any time soon, but I try to be as handy as I can and enjoy the satisfaction of seeing the results of hard work. Plus, I get to incorporate nerdy smart home gadgets which is fun.
This is a Jamstack website built with the React framework Next.js. The code lives in GitHub, and the continuous integration build pipeline is powered by GitHub Actions.
Made with ❤️ and ☕️ in North Carolina's Research Triangle.