Q: What has your career path looked like and how did it influence your current position and work?
A: I started with the University of Michigan as a Computer Consultant while I was a student at Eastern Michigan University majoring in Creative Writing. I originally started in retail working at Target, but after one Black Friday experience, I knew retail was not for me! Fortunately at the time, my friend Keon worked in the Angell Hall Desktop Support Shop and encouraged me to apply as a student temp. I worked for the Core Service Group and learned as much as I could about the process, often encouraging my fellow student workers and newer employees to take on as much as they could versus just going through the motions and doing the grunt work! Unfortunately, when I graduated from EMU, there were no full time opportunities available in LSA so I joined the MyWorkspace team for about 18 months before another opportunity opened up and I was able to “come home” to LSA where I’ve been a member of the MLB/LSA Desktop Support Team for the last three and a half years.
Q: Tell us a little bit about your educational background.
A: I started out majoring in Mechanical Engineering and was on track after the first year towards the degree but the heavy emphasis on mathematics made it a grind! I’ve always been an “English guy” and I love to read—especially science fiction and fantasy books. With some strong encouragement from my (future) wife, I made the bold move to follow my heart and switched my major to Creative Writing instead of engineering.
Q: What do you enjoy most about your position and team?
A: What I enjoy most about my position is being in a spot to help people and brighten their day. One of the best parts of my job is working with a faculty member who is having a rough day and the last thing they needed was their computer breaking down. I get to be the person to turn things around for them and it's an awesome feeling to do so. The thing I enjoy most about my team is that we all work together and look out for each other. They’re not only a blast to work with, but I can always count on them for support whenever I need help.
Q: What are some of the projects you are currently working on?
A: I’ve been working with Erich Suddendorf’s team on the Hardware Lifecycle project. The creation of this team has been a great help to our workflow by transitioning some of the functions like purchasing and equipment organization to Erich and his team. This specialization has helped lighten the load and allows us to focus more on support and helping our faculty, staff, and students with desktop issues. I’m the liaison for MLB and LSA on spinning things up and talk frequently with Erich and this fantastic team.
I’ve also been representing the MLB and LSA areas while working on the TeamDynamix Asset Records and Inventory Management Project with Katie Klosterman, Dennis Blay, and several student temps. This important and necessary work involves A LOT of data entry to catalog, track, and maintain our tens of thousands of assets.
Q: Outside of work what would we find you doing?
A: Writing! I’m also a published author and the first book, The Blighted Flame, in my Inassea Chronicles series was an Amazon best seller for Fantasy Adventure. I have an outline for the second book in the series, The Revenant Blade and am getting ready to start writing early next year.
I am currently working on a different cyberpunk fantasy series titled The Light Darkness Forgot, and should have a solid first draft by the end of the summer. If all goes well, it should be seeing publication around the holiday season this year.
When I’m not writing, I’m typically playing video games, watching movies or anime, and hanging out with my wife and two year-old daughter Liliana.
