About
Reporter first. Brand builder now.
I spent twenty years as a journalist deciding which companies' stories were worth telling. I've spent the thirteen since on the other side, making sure the ones I believe in get told well.
The reporter years.
At CNN I covered technology and space, which mostly meant hanging out with astronauts. At PBS I reported on the science of love and on entheogens (for science). Then I spent six years at The Wall Street Journal as its first video reporter, covering how new technology changes the way people live, work and connect. Along the way: Europe's debt crisis, conflict zones, Davos, getting tased (on purpose, for a story) and my biggest scoop ever, at the Olympics: Michael Phelps pees in the pool. 🏊
The brand years.
Now I build brands for category-creating companies whose technology is genuinely hard to explain: machine data at Splunk, attack-surface security at Expanse, space-based data at Spire Global, and AI that reskills workforces at Eightfold. Two IPOs, one acquisition, and a lot of whiteboards spent turning something technically true into something a person can repeat and believe.
What I care about.
Hard technology with a mission worth the difficulty: space and Earth observation, climate and health data, fintech that gives people economic agency, AI built responsibly, and secure infrastructure. Anything that makes an institution more trustworthy, not less. The more the work matters, the less excuse there is to be boring about it.
How I lead.
Collaboratively, without ego, and with a reporter's habit of asking one more question. People do their best thinking when you build the conditions for it and then get out of the way. I run on defiant joy and urgent optimism.
On AI.
It changes what we can make and how fast. What it can't make is taste, judgment and the feeling that makes someone believe you. That feeling is the last real differentiator, and building it is my job. Technology will power the future. Humans have to lead it. 💜
Off the clock.
I crochet (afghans, scarves, the occasional amigurumi), a craft handed down from my mom and her mom and the "Needle" in Needle Space Labs. I hike most weekends, finished the John Muir Trail, and explore the California coast with my dog riding shotgun.
