What is your background
I love business. It can be one of the most powerful tools to make an impact in a community, and is an avenue which allows creative freedom and has explicit grading. I’ve never been much for traditional education, but really enjoy learning new things. Before starting HiViz, I ran a stage lighting and sound business. In that business, I developed an intimate familiarity with connecting tech and emotion of a user which has become very handy in the HiViz business as we’re launching new products in lighting.
After my stage lighting business, I started a bio-fuels business that allowed fleet owners to market the ecologic benefits of alternative energy while specifically focusing on the economic benefit for the owner. The highlight of my career was converting then-governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s personal fleet of H1 Hummer’s to burn recycled vegetable oil.
I’ve always loved waterskiing, and after I wound up bio-fuels business, I spent my time working in and around the water sports industry. I met my wife Kaoma skiing, and made life long friends around the world in the sport. Eventually though, every water skier has to reckon with the fact that the industry is small, and their body isn’t made out of titanium. I wasn’t good enough to make a long-term career in the sport, and began looking for something else to do. If you’re interested in hearing how I made the transition from waterskiing to firefighting and lighting, you’ll have to check out episodes 1 and 2 of our podcast, the 2448. www.the2448.com
What do you do at HiViz?
Job Title: Chief Executive Officer
Start Date: Dec 2010
Describe your work/day-to-day: I spend my day working with department heads on new, big, broken, or stuck initiatives at HiViz. A lot of the future-looking technical initiatives are concepts I work on or develop, and I am frequently involved in productions or media related activities. I have a daily leadership stand-up meeting, weekly department head 1:1’s, and quarterly strategic planning meetings with the team. My role as the CEO also includes allocating capitol, evaluating new business deals and opportunities, managing supplier relationships, and acting as the public face of the business in our industry.
What is your “why” at HiViz?
I’m a Firefighter, an EMT, and a HAZMAT Technician by training. I’ve worked both professionally and as a volunteer since 2011 when I started the business. I like helping people, and have found a purpose and meaning working both as a public servant, and as an entrepreneur serving my fellow firefighters. HiViz is my brainchild, and we exist to help other first responders save lives.
At a deeper level, not every call a first responder will run in their career will end the way they hope. Unfortunately, bad things sometimes happen to good people, and as public servants, unfortunately we sometimes get a front seat view to a really bad day. After a call goes south, I never want lighting or the related technology on the apparatus to be something that comes up in the mental replay of that call, or for a first responder to wonder “if only we’d chosen ____ on our apparatus, maybe we’d have had the tool we needed to save a life.” Will we get it right every time? No, but we’ve built our business on foundational skills taught in the fire academy; plan, backup, and backup to the backup. Always be prepared; and take care of those in need. That can be our customers, their customers, or the communities that rely on them.
What is a quote you live by?
Get “In the arena” – Theodore Roosevelt.
“If I had the worlds most difficult problem to solve and only an hour to do it, I’d spend 55 minutes researching the problem and 5 mins solving it.” – Albert Einstein. And for context, I’m not one to spend a lot of time thinking on most things, but when it’s the world’s most important problem, I do take my time to understand it fully before pulling the trigger.
Would you rather live in a world where everyone’s hats talk or all dogs text instead of bark?
I would like to be able to communicate with Slick. Its extremely interesting to me that we can be such good friends even though she doesn’t speak English. I think I know what she’s thinking, but I don’t really, and the words I make up for her emotions are totally invented in my brain not hers. Kaoma thinks I wouldn’t like the simplicity of a dogs brain or thoughts, and that I should just enjoy the magic of the relationship I can have with a dog friend even though I can’t talk to it. But I am still curious.
Would you rather always having to enter rooms by announcing your arrival in song or, always have to leave by doing a backflip?
Song. For sure. I think I may already do that actually…
Would you rather only being able to whisper, or only be able to shout?
There is nothing quiet about my personality and I really like to tell people things loudly.
Would you rather have the ability to see through physical objects but be permanently colorblind, or have super hearing but only in one ear?
Both could be interesting, but I would definitely choose being able to see through physical but being colorblind. I have an imagination vivid and visual enough I think I could effectively replace the colors in my vision with colors in my brain. I see so many colors, I sometimes think I might see more colors than some people. I love color. But I could go without it now that I have seen them all. But since I cant see through stuff today, and there isn’t a practical device that could be worn like a hearing aid, I think the seeing-through-stuff trick would be particularly interesting.
