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I’ve had a pretty good run these last 50 years. I had a great childhood enabled by loving, hard working parents. I created a lifetime of memories with my brother, cousins and friends. I immortalized myself Al Bundy style in high school soccer. I got into college. And graduated. I built a successful career doing something I’m really good at. I traveled the world. I spent a few hours with Chris Farley on the set of SNL. I met a girl. I got married. I became a father. Twice. I rode a seesaw in a Mexican bullring. I saw my oldest child go off to college. I created my own business. I helped other people less fortunate. I lived. A lot.

On March 4, 2019, I begin my next 50 year run. For some, it’s a time of crisis. A wake up call to things not experienced. Me? 50 is a time to re-rev the engine. An opportunity to reflect on all I’ve had the privilege and opportunity to see, hear and do. A chance to take some time before those candles light in March to recalibrate where I want to go and what I want to do based on what I’ve learned to make these next 50 trips around the sun even more exciting and fulfilling than the first 50.

Understand the privilege of being in a position to choose what and who I work with. Be discerning in choosing clients who see the world through a wide angle lens and work on projects that advance society for the many instead of the few.

No red convertible sports car, but an opportunity to shift gears and watch the tachometer flirt with the dial’s red zone. A shift informed by studying my past and observing the present. Because one of the things I’ve come to realize is that, as a society, we have a bad habit of locking people into impenetrable career membranes that too often squelch what makes a person whole. So over the past year, I’ve taken time to explore the intersection of what I’m good at, what people need and what stokes my creative flame. I studied the state of the PR industry, spoke with startup founders and VCs about what they really need from their PR partners, and refined my photographic eye. What I found was:

• Companies value my ability to help them build their stories. Talking about what they do comes naturally. Telling people why they do what they do is surprisingly difficult. I help them find that why (which frequently helps them find their product market fit).

• Founders rely on me to guide them on communicating better. Having an experienced, objective communicator to bounce investor, customer, press and employee communications off of is invaluable. 

• VCs like that I don’t needlessly suck up valuable budget/capital. PR agencies are expensive. And the disintegration of trade media means a startup’s PR requirements aren’t what they once were. I wrote more about this important shift here.

• People like my photographic style and ability to tell a story through my images. Humans are visual creatures. Storytelling has been the core of humanity’s progress since the dawn of the caveman. Organizations are beginning to recognize the powerful combination of editorial and photography to tell the stories of the humans who make what they do possible.

I’ve been a valuable communication coach to nearly 20 startup founders and their exec teams. I’ve served as the acting director of PR for startups who otherwise couldn’t afford someone with my experience. I’ve discovered I have an eye for capturing people’s personality and using those images to help organizations tell their stories. I’ve found I really like to give back to the communities I’m part of. What stops people from building services around the spectrum of things they do best, the things they love to do, especially when they can combine them to bring value to others? Why do we let a self imposed career force field trap us us from living our complete lives? Why be one thing?

So that’s what I did. I took my reflections, industry knowledge and passions and built services and projects around them. Some of them are straightforward. A few are ambitious with the potential to have a significantly positive impact on the technology industry and those around it.

Services

• Communication Coach: On-call senior-level communications counsel, influencer research, monitoring/connections, marketing copy editor, weekly strategy session. Read more here.

• Messaging/Story Development: Wrapping what you do into the larger narrative of why you do it and making your story compelling to the media and customers.

• Conference Portraits: Give attendees at your next conference something of value instead of a t-shirt. Perfect for large organizations and foundations and a way for conference organizers to allow smaller, less-well-funded startups to participate in sponsorship. Here’s a peek from Cloud Foundry Summit in Basel and a few of the faces from Gluecon.

• Corporate Editorial Photography: Where the combination of words and images truly shines. I embed with your executives/teams to help your corp comm department tell your stories as they are happening, to help your developer advocates highlight the humans behind the code, and support your CEOs and top executives to strengthen and personalize the impact of their leadership.

Projects (in development; seeking underwriters)

• Humans:Code: An editorial photo project documenting a cross-section of people across the technology industry doing what they love to do when they aren’t tethered to a keyboard and screen.

• Going Home: An episodic photo essay that follows underrepresented Silicon Valley founders back to their hometowns to capture and tell stories about what their life was like in the town they grew up in and the influence it had on them before they moved to the Valley.

• See Me: Environmental portraits and profiles of tech’s diverse workforce, allowing underrepresented communities to see a reflection of themselves (a major obstacle to tech entry).

• My Town: Ongoing local portrait series in conjunction with CB Cares to highlight the educators and support staff of the Central Bucks School District.

The start of a new year is an opportunity to refocus on what matters. A chance to reset. To create a clean slate. To create a springboard for the next year…or 50.

There are moments as a photographer when you know at the first click of the shutter magic is about to happen. Moments when all guards are let down and a subject’s true self jumps through the glass of your lens and right into the camera itself. I had one of those moments during a recent two day corporate portrait shoot for the Cloud Foundry Foundation in Basel, Switzerland, when Chisara Nwabara stepped in front of my camera.

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And that photographic lightning struck again when David Bluestone graced the set.

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And again and again over the course of my time shooting with the awesome Cloud Foundry community in Basel.

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I felt her hand on my arm before I saw her.

I had wandered down Ochsengasse barely a block off one of Basel’s main streets. Approaching Webergasse, I apparently and accidentally stumbled into the city’s red light district. More like a corner than an actual district. An estimated 800 prostitutes legally ply their craft in this Swiss town along the Rhine. Prostitution has been legal in Basel since 1942. I gave a polite, yet demonstrative, “No. Thank you.” and made my exit back toward Claraplatz.

I was in Basel to shoot headshots at Cloud Foundry Summit. After the conference, I took some time to explore this corner of Europe where the borders of France, Germany and Switzerland meet. I flâneured like Hemingway at the buvettes on the banks of the Rhine. I stopped for lunch, okay, Prosecco, on the Münsterplatz as kids scootered past and tourists craned their necks to the steeple of Basel Minster, which was built between 1019 and 1500. I watched members of an older generation drink wine and toss bocce balls beneath the changing leaves.

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And I made a new friend. She sat at my cafe table on the edge of Münsterplatz as I sipped my Prosecco. She ordered a tea. I told the waiter to put it on my bill. I asked her name in my best German. She told me it was Draga. I then asked where she lived. She said Basel. This is why I learn basic phrases when I travel. It doesn’t take much to make a connection and travel like a traveler instead of a tourist.

These are a few of the images I captured during my brief stay. Click one of the images to see the uncropped versions.

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A few years ago I was asked to shoot a few promotional images for the band, Barrage8. Super awesome humans who really made the job easy. Love seeing one of the final shots used on their concert poster and on student designed t-shirts. Music — and music education — matters.

I just got back from my annual Monktoberfest sojourn to Portland, Maine. I’m home for roughly 24 hours and then head off on a weeklong corporate portrait assignment in Basel, Switzerland. It will be the 25th country I’ve had the privilege of visiting. 171 more to go.

It was weird not having my Canon with me in Portland, but felt prudent to leave it home with the other equipment I’ll use in Basel. My office floor is currently an organized grid of camera bodies, lenses and lights ready to be packed up. Luckily, my iPhone was able to capture some of the beauty of Casco Bay during our sunset boat trip on Wednesday night.

When I get back from Switzerland, I’m excited to see images from my “This Is Our Town” project displayed as part of the pre-roll during the Saturday kids’ matinees at The County Theater in Doylestown, Pa. My daughters have had the luck and privilege of being taught by amazing teachers. Teachers whose work, caring and above and beyond effort too often goes unheralded. Working with the CB Cares Educational Foundation, I created portraits of our school district’s art department. The arts are the foundation for a well rounded, long term life of learning. They cause us to question and think about the fuzzy gray areas outside of the black and white lines of life we often live.

Earlier this year I challenged myself to focus more of my photography on developing my portraiture skills. Many friends, relatives and strangers have given of their time and patience to sit, stand and bend in front of my lens. There’s a good chance you’ve seen some of those images here or on my website.

One person who noticed them was the Director of Arts Education at the Michener Museum in Doylestown, Pa. She approached me to pilot the museum’s first workshop centered on photography. We’re kicking it off later this summer with a fun program for 10-15 year olds.

The Michener is named after Doylestown native James Michener. In 1948, he won this little thing called a Pulitzer for a book he wrote about the South Pacific. Local playwrights who went by the names of Rodgers and Hammerstein turned the book into a Broadway play.

While it’s a long way from seeing my photographs hanging on the walls of this great museum, I’ll take it.

Standing behind the podium at last night’s CB Cares Celebrity Waiter Gala, Kimberly Cambra reminded attendees “When you have Care in your name, you do.” And she has. To the tune of more than $500,000 over the years. Money — and, more importantly, time and effort — dedicated to enrich the educational experience of our community’s students. Last night was my third year creating portraits at the event. These are a couple of my faves from last night’s Parisian theme gathering.

I’ve had the privilege of working with really smart people over the course of my career. Individuals who created the computer code that runs the world we live in. Corporate executives managing billion dollar businesses. And incredibly intelligent startup founders like Carbon Robotics CEO Rosanna Myers with the vision to see the world beyond the disruptive technologies they build. I encourage you to give this talk a listen to understand better the value of treating humans like humans and not machines.

 

Tech trades aren’t what they were. There are but a handful of true technology trade media outlets left in an industry of wide-eyed innovation. There are even fewer traditional reporters.

And while the number of news outlets and reporters contracts, the number of startups and companies with stories to tell grows. Many of these companies are shut out of the storytelling process, never able to rise above the noise.

There are simply not enough news outlets to write all the great stories that deserve to be told. Story volume and media economics dictate that, like Silicon Valley itself, merit isn’t enough.

My friend Ron Favali and I believe there’s a way to fix this, and in the process, raise the visibility of those working to create a more diverse and inclusive industry.

 

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TechDeux is a media site designed to fill the gap between existing trade journalism and public relations. It’s what happens when you step back and look at the media ecosystem through a wide angle, unfiltered lens. It’s what can be built when you don’t try to disrupt an industry, but, instead, help it.

If closing the gap between PR and journalism was all TechDeux did, it would be enough. But we wanted to build something that meant more. Something that helped the entire technology industry, not just marketers and journalists.

Unlike traditional models, TechDeux’s storytellers underwrite the promotion of non-profit organizations focused on increasing diversity and inclusion in tech. In exchange, these underwriters are able to submit opinionated editorial content on the TechDeux platform.

We’re launching this summer. So, if you’re a startup, PR agency or VC with a portfolio of companies who want to make the industry a better place for everyone, shoot me a note to see how you can get involved underwriting TechDeux. In the meantime, we’re looking for your feedback: What’s missing in this model? What would you like to see? Which non-profits you think deserve to be seen and heard?

Sure, this may be an incremental fix to a bigger problem. But change only happens when someone is willing to try something different.

My mother’s father was a member of the 82nd Airborne during World War II. I am told he was one of the paratroopers who dropped into France on D-Day. My father’s father served in both the Pacific and European theaters during the war as a member of the 86th Infantry Division. One rests in peace near Arlington, Texas, the other in Arlington National Cemetery.

Both were role models in their own ways. My one grandfather showed me how to always keep my chin up, even when his had a cancer eating away at it that eventually took his life. My other grandfather showed me that family isn’t what you are born into and that love and playfulness knows not of age.

I think about them often. Especially on holidays like Memorial Day where people come together to honor those like my grandfathers who sacrificed to defend the democratic ideals upon which America was built.

This year, the small town of Doylestown, Pa., nestled near the banks of the Delaware River where the very concept of these United States first formed, celebrated the 150th anniversary of its Memorial Day Parade, making it the oldest Memorial Day parade in the country. 15,000 people lined Court, North and Main Streets to watch 96 marching units, 142 vehicles and 2,150 participants honor our country’s fallen heroes.

These are some of the images.