My Story

I’ve never had what you’d call a straight-line career, which is probably one reason I’ve been useful to the organizations and teams I’ve worked with. I’ve spent most of my professional life figuring out how to make things better, whether that was a newspaper, a business model, a marketing strategy, or a team trying to get where it wanted to go.

I grew up in Illinois in a close family, and that shaped a lot of who I am. I was lucky enough to grow up with confidence at home, along with a pretty healthy dose of expectation. My mom believed I was great, as moms tend to do, and my dad believed I could always do better. That turned out to be a pretty effective combination. One gave me confidence. The other gave me drive. Somewhere in there I also picked up a curiosity about people, ideas, and how things work, which has probably been the most consistent thread in my life.

I was a skinny kid, so I naturally gravitated toward the things I could actually do well. Running was one of them. I’ve loved it ever since. It started as something I was good at and became something that helped shape me. It still does. These days I mostly run for fitness, sanity, and waist-size management. I’m not especially fast anymore, which is a polite way of saying the mind is willing and the legs have filed a formal complaint. But I still love it. Over the years I’ve done nearly 40 marathons, an Ironman, and a couple of half Ironmans. I’ve also coached kids in track, which may be the only setting where anyone is willing to treat running laps as a character-building experience.

Academically, I made some choices that were probably not designed for immediate wealth. I earned a degree in political science with a minor in English from Eastern Illinois University, then followed that up with graduate work in sports administration at the University of Maryland. At the time, I thought I might wind up in college athletics, maybe as an athletic director or general manager. It turns out I was either ahead of my time or not nearly well-connected enough. Probably both. Either way, that path didn’t open, and in hindsight I’m glad it didn’t.

Instead, I found my way into newspapers.

I started in circulation, which is the professional term for “head paper boy.” I loved newspapers almost immediately. I loved what they meant to a community. I loved that they could inform people, challenge people, celebrate people, and occasionally irritate the right people. I loved that no two days were alike. One day you might be talking advertising, the next editorial, the next finance, and somewhere in there trying to solve three problems before lunch. It suited me.

I moved up quickly and became a publisher at a fairly young age. As it turned out, I loved that, too. I wrote columns, created events, worked with local leaders, served on boards, tried to strengthen the businesses I led, and spent a lot of time thinking about how to make a publication more valuable to the community it served. That was always the goal for me. A newspaper shouldn’t just exist. It should matter. It should be useful. It should feel connected to the place and the people reading it…

One thing I learned along the way was that I was especially good at turning around underperforming operations. The formula was usually less glamorous than people hoped. Listen to the staff. Make the product better. Be honest about what isn’t working. Get rid of what’s not helping. Then move. Most of the time, the answers were already in the building. You just had to ask the right questions and be willing to act.

Eventually, of course, the newspaper industry ran headfirst into the internet. Information started moving faster, advertising changed, and the economics that had sustained local newspapers for so long began to fall apart. That was a painful thing to watch from the inside because I really believed in the work. I still do. But belief and reality don’t always travel together. Spoiler alert: newspapers did not exactly come roaring back.

That shift led me into website development and digital marketing, and in a lot of ways it was the right next chapter for me. I quickly realized that while building websites was useful, building recurring revenue and measurable results was a much better business. So I studied. A lot. I dove into digital marketing, analytics, lead generation, search, content, strategy, and the mechanics of what actually drives growth. I came to see Google Analytics as a kind of North Star—not because numbers are exciting on their own, but because they tell the truth. Or at least they tell enough of the truth to keep you honest.

That work let me bring together a lot of the things I’ve always cared about: communication, strategy, leadership, problem-solving, and results. It also reinforced something I had learned years earlier: a good story matters, but a good story tied to real performance matters even more.

At this point in my life, my motivation is a little different than it was when I was younger. I’m not chasing titles. I’m not trying to conquer an organization or collect trophies. What I enjoy most now is being part of a team working toward something meaningful. I like helping smart people succeed. I like solving problems. I like being useful. I don’t need the spotlight. I get a lot of satisfaction from knowing I helped move something forward, even if nobody outside the room ever knows it. That’s enough for me.

Outside of work, family is the center of everything.

My wife has been there since the beginning of my newspaper journey, and she has helped me through every stop, challenge, reinvention, and half-baked idea along the way. We’ve raised two kids we’re incredibly proud of. Our son is in Michigan. He played college baseball at Oakland, found his wife there, and now works as an accountant. He and his wife live in White Lake, Michigan. Our daughter lives in Dallas and is a rapidly ascending salesperson with Gartner. My wife and I are immensely proud of both of them, and like most parents with grown kids, we’re always looking for the next excuse to go visit.

When I’m not working, I still like to stay active, mostly to preserve the illusion that I’m still in decent shape. I love hiking and had the chance to hike the Inca Trail, which was every bit as memorable as advertised. I also love live music and one of my favorite things is catching concerts at Red Rocks, which is about as good a place as there is to remind yourself that some experiences still beat staying home on the couch. I read constantly—probably more than is healthy if you’re trying to make small talk at normal human gatherings—because I’ve always been curious and probably always will be.

So that’s me.

A guy from Illinois with a political science degree, an English minor, a background in newspapers, a second career in digital marketing, a weakness for good stories, good teams, and measurable results, and just enough endurance-sports history to make poor decisions sound disciplined.

If we end up working together, that’s what I bring with me: experience, perspective, curiosity, honesty, a sense of humor, and a real desire to help good people do good work.