I didn't start in product. I started in graphic design — the kind where you spend hours agonizing over kerning and whether a shade of blue is reading as trustworthy or cold. That instinct for how things feel to the person on the other side of the screen has never really left.
From design I moved into project management, which sounds like a lateral move but wasn't. Running cross-functional projects taught me that the most important design decisions aren't visual — they're about what you're building, in what order, and why. I got good at holding complexity together across teams and keeping things moving without pretending I had answers I didn't.
Then came a master's degree in human-computer interaction from Iowa State, which gave me language for things I'd been doing by feel. I learned to think about users as systems — not just people with preferences, but people with cognitive models, contexts, and constraints that shape every interaction. That's the frame I carry into every product problem.
The last decade has been in product management at Quantum Workplace, a mid-size HR software company in Omaha. I've led the squad responsible for our core product area, which is the kind of role where you wear PM, PO, and scrum master hats simultaneously and learn to move fast without breaking things people depend on. I've led 380+ customer conversations personally and helped build a team culture where sustained, high-cadence customer contact was the norm rather than the exception.
I care a lot about the space between data and intuition — knowing when to trust the numbers, when to trust what you're hearing in the room, and when to hold both in tension until something resolves. I'm not an Agile zealot, but I understand why the practices matter. I believe in building with engineers and designers, not at them.
My leadership philosophy in five words: I collect perspectives. I don't collect consensus. That means real input, genuine decisions, and accountability for both.
M.S. Human-Computer Interaction — Iowa State University
Undergraduate in Graphic Design