This Accidental Geek

I was always fairly bright, but when I went to College on a scholarship, I really had no clue who or what I wanted to be. I had led a fairly sheltered, small-town childhood, so just about everything in the "real world" was new to me.

I had a pretty good analytical mind, but there were too many others that were just a little bit brighter than me, so I never figured a career in math or technology would be in the cards for me. I did love science, and thought I loved marine life, so I decided to major in Marine Biology.

The first couple of years of college went pretty much as expected, but by my junior year I was starting to get bored with the memorization-focused curriculum for Biology, and the labs became tedious (and formaldehyde-smelly).

By the end of junior year, I was on the verge of failing and giving up, and I knew a dramatic change needed to happen. I had taken a couple of required introductory computer science classes, and I aced both of them, and totally enjoyed the cerebral exercises of computer logic. So, I decided to switch over to computer science.

Sadly, my little college didn't have anything to offer (technology wise) except for one small mainframe where all programming was done on punch cards. PCs were just coming around, and the school couldn't afford those or even basic terminals. I enjoyed the challenge of coding, but had an god-awful professor and hated coding on punch cards, so my interest in Computer Science got squelched over the year [If I would have waited one more year, they would later get both PCs and LCD terminals -- that could possibly have changed everything for me...].

When I next looked up, my scholarship was over and I was in my fifth year of college with only 3 1/2 years of completed courses behind me (I had been working part time to pay the rent), and I reluctantly went to see my advisor. "Based on the courses I have completed, and my general interests, what is the curriculum I could switch to and graduate in, as quickly as possible?" I would query. I would graduate a year later with a major in Business.

While I was working on completing my degree, and working to pay the bills, PCs had really begun to hit mainstreet. While I couldn't afford one myself, short of the TI-99 I bought mostly to play games on, I certainly understood them better than most folks, based solely on my past courses and my little TI-99. As I moved forward in my education, I needed more work, more money, and a job closer to school.

Just behind the college, a small chain of computer stores opened a branch, selling knock-off Apple II computers I knew I had an interest in computers, and needed work, so I called on the Store manager.
"Do you have a Computer Science degree," he asked. Nope.

"Experience selling computers?" Double nope.

"Are you handsome/outgoing/brilliant or even qualified...." Crap.

That manager never returned my calls after that interview. But a few months later, that manager had moved on and the next manager hired me for a low-level sales position. Six months later, I was the store manager, and a year after that I was regional manager for this small chain. I didn't make a lot of money, but the work was easy, and there was a lot of downtime, so I had plenty of time to build my technical skills and programming knowledge.

I ended up graduating college in Marketing, but I had developed some really solid technology skills, and so I decided to stick around in the computer sales game. Several companies and several jobs later, I would find myself as a field sales engineer for Apple. I owe a great deal of thanks to two gents (Tom and Glenn) who really believed in me, and despite my skill shortage [at least on paper], I got into a pretty sweet gig at Apple, where I interfaced with great customers everyday, and still continued to work on my tech skills. I was hired into a job where most of my peers were not only bright, but also college trained, so I was sort of an underdog from the first day, and would spend much of my career in that mode... I felt like a salmon swimming up river just trying to keep up with the amazing talent of my peers.

I would end up spending a total of 18 years at Apple... over a stretch of 21 years. I spent some time at Oracle and at a University, but Apple always felt the most like home.

The first 10 or 15 years at Apple was a wild and mostly-fun ride. In the beginning, the company was doing well, and my job had a lot of personal freedom as long as we were successful. We got to interface with amazing customers all the time (The Smithsonian, the White House, several Governors, Winton Marsalis, Harvard University, and some amazing educators around the country). Everything we did was pretty much decided locally and very customer-driven (I wrote an educational book and developed an interactive CD-ROM, all in support of my job and with the blessing of Apple). We could pretty much do whatever we wanted, as long as we focused on customer satisfaction and increasing the use of Macs.

Bad financial times for Apple would come in the latter part of that period, and everyone was pretty much focused on walking the company line, and hoping you weren't named in the next round of layoffs. I saw some pretty amazing people get let go during that time, and those losses still sting when I think of them today.

The last 4 or 5 years at Apple weren't a great fit for me. I landed in various roles where I was not the most qualified, and not emotionally invested in. I still worked with great co-workers and customers, but the company had changed a lot. Apple had become more sales-focused, more profit-driven, more back-stabbing, and much more about the numbers than the customers. While I totally understand the business case to change that way, it simply wasn't the Apple that I started with, or that I wanted to be part of, and we would part ways in year 18.

I am still happily involved with Macs, technology and education, and each day I get to apply the skills I developed at Apple to my life and to my current job.

The one thing that has stuck with me the most is my love for trying out-of-the-box challenges. Even to this day, I enjoy trying new techniques I've never tried before, despite people telling me "you can't do that, you've never even done that before!" I usually take a statement like that as a personal challenge. That being said, I don't always succeed at every attempt. I do always leave each endeavor smarter and wiser than I was before I started, and I enjoy that immensely.