6.02.2014

My Next Adventure

As many of you know, 2014 has been a challenging year for me professionally. In February my business partner and I made the decision to shut down our company, CPUsage. While the decision to do so was not as hard as I thought, the reality of closing the door on that chapter of my life was painful. Starting and running a company has been my dream since I was a young boy and I never imagined how tough it would be to walk away.

That said, I sprung back to my old self quickly and began planning my next move. Today, I am excited to announce that I have accepted a position with New Relic, a software startup that's nothing less than a rocket ship. At New Relic, I'll be the Product Manager for their latest and greatest product called Insights, a data analytics platform. New Relic is headquartered in San Francisco but I'll be based in the Portland office with about 40% of the company's total staff. If you'd like to learn more about New Relic, head on over to http://www.newrelic.com.

I'm also excited to announce that as part of a personal plan to remain involved with startups & entrepreneurship, I've signed on as an advisor at two exciting Portland companies. Both of the below named companies have products I am excited about and founders I believe in. They WILL disrupt industries and I'm honored to be along for the ride. I've limited myself to 3 advisor roles at any given time, leaving me with room for one more if the right opportunity comes along. The companies I'm currently advising are:

  • SendSmart is a Unified Cloud Communications tool that allows sales people to easily communicate with their customers via phone, text, email, and social media all from a single platform. Learn more at http://www.sendsmart.com.
  • Scratch-it is a unique and interactive marketing tool that infuses the engagement of a lottery scratch-it into standard email campaigns. Learn more at http://www.scratch-it.com.

In addition to active advisor roles with early stage startups, I plan to stay active in two other ways:

  • Mentoring & Volunteering- I am a long time and active volunteer with Startup Weekend where I plan to participate in an increasing number of events (18 so far!). I am also humbled to be a TechStars mentor for their current startup accelerator with Sprint and their past startup accelerator with Nike. I plan to continue mentoring with TechStars corporate programs as opportunities arise and I'll be adding other startup accelerators to that list, with a new announcement coming soon!
  • Speaking Engagements- I love to talk and now I finally feel that I have something valuable to say! I am currently working on a speech that can be adapted to general business or entrepreneurship and given at conferences, events, and other venues. If you know of anyone that might benefit from hearing about my experiences, please let me know! I'll be sure to invite you to my first public talk.

So, in the coming months you can find me working my butt off at New Relic, advising awesome early stage startups, volunteering for Startup Weekend, and sharing my experiences with others on stage at events. I hope to connect with each and every one of you in person soon, stay in touch!