Humans and data have an age-old meeting place, the spreadsheet. My story in data started early and has culminated into the company I lead today. I have the honor of working with a talented team that shares my passion and is pushing the limits of spreadsheets for enterprises, solving complex business problems more simply. I love encouraging data and code literacy, helping college students to grow their technology careers, and professionals advance theirs, by better wielding data. We have come so far in technology, but there is still much opportunity ahead. I grew up with spreadsheets and for those who did too, here is my story. My father showed me Visicalc for the first time in middle school as he showed me around our new Apple IIe, but at my age the games were more fun. He later taught me Lotus 1-2-3 and macros to help with my teenage businesses, one day proudly showing me the new WYSIWYG feature that made the spreadsheet look like a virtual piece of paper with graphics. Astonishing.During college, I worked in computer labs sponsored by HP, seeing new hardware and software, including the new kid on the block: Excel 2.0. After graduating and being hired by a CPA firm, I saw Lotus 1-2-3 continue to break open the spreadsheet market before losing ground to Excel. Multiple tabs, Goal Seek, and VBA were all genius innovations then, and each changed how I worked. By then, Lotus was a half-step behind, clunky, and unmissed. I even saw Pivot Tables born, as Lotus published the idea with the release of Improv, which Excel put to much better use in Excel 95. Excel opened the door into Microsoft Access, which later expanded to SQL Server, ASP and .NET.I was an early adopter, getting in trouble by automating without permission, distracted from my regular work but all in the effort to make that work better. In reality, I was helping Shadow IT get its negative reputation. After leaving the CPA firm, I nurtured my technology distraction further in technology user groups and the growing online forums websites. At every opportunity in my financial controller positions, I was leveraging databases and programming while keeping the spreadsheet close in hand. Each of my subsequent employers took advantage of my technology hobby, as I took advantage of the learning opportunity. A perfect deal. Then it happened in 2006: my last employer wanted to become my first customer, and my technology company was founded. This is where things got serious in re-imagining the spreadsheet and I haven’t looked back.
Listed skills include Performance Improvement, Corporate Financial Reporting, Financial Accountability, Cloud Reporting, and 31 others.
