Supporting and mentoring talented individuals is just one aspect of being a successful manager. Being able to effectively manage multiple education project resources such as education stakeholders, subject matter experts, project timelines and requirements, and content development efforts is critical to delivering quality educational materials. As someone who has worked autonomously throughout most of his career, I understand the importance of personal motivation, attention to detail, and being committed to the goals of the organization to ensure the success of any education project.

I have been fortunate to work with (and for) many exceptional managers. As a result, I have observed first hand what it takes to be an effective manager from my professional mentors. My management philosophy is simple—manage people as you would want to be managed. I truly believe that personal success is only achieved through collaboration, cooperation, and providing support to fellow colleagues and staff. I look forward to new career opportunities that allow me to expand my experience in management by supporting and mentoring others the same way my managers have done for me throughout my career.

As Manager of Education Services at IP Commerce, I managed a small team of technical staff comprised of a full-time media developer and technical writer. As is all too common in today's competitive business climate, budgetary constraints forced the layoff of these talented individuals after 2 years. Despite my abbreviated management experience, I am confident that the experience I received in this role has prepared me for future opportunities in a management capacity.

We've all heard the saying, "a picture is worth a thousand words". When it comes to instructional design and e-learning development, one's ability to envision and create not only engaging, but appropriate, visual elements is essential to effectively explaining complex concepts or technologies. Besides, people like looking at pictures.

I have been working with industry standard design applications such as Adobe Creative Suite for over 15 years, going back to my early days as a Product Specialist/Evangelist at Quark, Inc. This extensive experience has provided me with an "eye for design" that enables me to create a variety of online content such as graphics, animations, supporting audio, and appropriate, intuitive UI navigation elements. I have also developed e-learning content that is both SCORM-conformant and Section 508-compliant.

I also understand that creating visually engaging material does not guarantee the material's educational effectiveness. Without clear, concise goals and targeted learning objectives, even the sexiest e-learning materials can leave participants scratching their heads. I have extensive experience implementing the ADDIE model of instructional systems design to meet training goals and learning objectives across a wide range of delivery mechanisms.

Finally, I believe the most effective learning takes place when a blended approach to education design is implemented that combines e-learning materials with facilitator-led sessions or other collaborative environments to ensure participants are truly engaged in the learning process and not simply passive learners trying to absorb as much information as possible. To read more about my approach to training development and instructional design methodology, click here.

Examples of my work will be provided upon request.

In addition to my vast instructional design and e-learning development experience, I am a highly skilled technical writer and content developer who has a natural gift for explaining complex technologies and business processes in understandable terms by relying on a balanced mix of foundational knowledge content, creative graphics, process flow diagrams, and other media elements. I believe that technical documentation can provide educational value if designed properly, and this is something I have had great personal success with throughout my career.

I have over 5 years of experience working directly with established Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC) processes using Microsoft Visual Studio and version control systems such as Subversion, TortoiseSVN, and Git. I have worked with numerous software engineers and technology architects throughout my career, which has not only taught me how to engage these denizens of dark offices, but distill their essence into content that even the most non-technical can understand.

As the great jazz bassist, Charles Mingus once said, “Making the simple complicated is commonplace; making the complicated simple, that's creativity.”

As a Master Technical Instructor with J.D. Edwards/PeopleSoft, I was responsible for the delivery of over 8 weeks of unique technical course material to ERP technology consultants, technology partners, and employees in dynamic, highly collaborative classroom environments. My charismatic presentation style and ability to not only understand, but articulate highly technical subject matter, both verbally and visually, earned me 11 training recognition awards during my 6-year career with the company. I was voted Instructor of the Year in 2000 for the J.D. Edwards Education Center.

In addition to my classroom education delivery experience, I have spearheaded the technical implementation of the Moodle Course Management System (CMS) to provide "just-in-time", e-learning modules to diverse corporate audiences. I have also delivered numerous remote training sessions using popular web conferencing tools such as ReadyTalk and WebEx.

Finally, as a Product Specialist/Evangelist for Quark, Inc, I traveled extensively across North America delivering multimedia product seminars, demonstrations, and training sessions in a variety of venues; from large auditoriums, industry conferences and trade shows, and client sites in the electronic publishing industry.