About
Three decades inside the moments that change a company.
Not because I planned it that way. Because that's where the interesting problems kept showing up.
Not because I planned it that way. Because that's where the interesting problems kept showing up.
My career has taken me through the early internet, digital media, content marketing, podcasting, and now artificial intelligence. Looking back, there's a clear pattern. Every few years, technology changes the rules, and someone has to help people make sense of what happens next.
I've been fortunate to spend nearly thirty years in those rooms.
Long before anyone talked about digital transformation, I was working at Grand Royal, the Beastie Boys' record label and magazine, helping put artists online when the web still felt experimental.
From there I joined ARTISTdirect, where we were building artist websites, fan communities, e-commerce, and digital experiences years before social media existed. None of us thought we were inventing a category. We were simply trying to answer new questions that didn't have established answers yet.
Looking back, that's probably where I learned to love ambiguity.
Over the next two decades I found myself inside one industry transformation after another.
At AOL, I was part of the shift from a subscription business to the open web. At DailyCandy, I helped one of the internet's most beloved editorial brands evolve after its acquisition by Comcast. At Outbrain, I built the global marketing organization as content marketing emerged into its own category. At Endeavor, I helped launch a new podcast business as audio became a meaningful platform for storytelling, creators, and brands.
The questions are always different. The work is surprisingly similar.
Eventually I realized something. Companies weren't hiring me because I was a marketer. They were hiring me because I could make sense of change.
Sometimes that meant positioning. Sometimes it meant launching something new. Sometimes it meant helping leadership teams navigate uncertainty before they knew exactly what they were deciding.
Different industries gave me different vocabulary. The underlying questions never really changed.
That realization eventually became The Vault Collective.
Some are founders preparing for their next stage of growth. Others are established organizations entering new markets, launching products, repositioning their business, or adapting to new technologies.
Every engagement is different. The questions are remarkably similar.
Those are the conversations I enjoy most.
In the late '90s, that meant artist websites. Today it means AI systems.
Over the past year I've built TVC-OS, the operating system that supports our work at The Vault Collective. I've also built a Jazz Fest AI concierge that could eventually power other festivals, an ACT test prep application for my daughter, a Thanksgiving planning assistant, editorial publishing systems, research workflows, and more little experiments than I can count.
Most of them were never intended to become products. I build because building is how I learn. Every experiment teaches me something about people, technology, or the way ideas move through organizations. Eventually those lessons find their way back into client work.
After three decades, I noticed something.
The best strategic decisions rarely come from a single workshop or conversation. They come from observing. Asking better questions. Researching what other people overlook. Connecting ideas across industries. Making decisions. Learning from the outcome. Then doing it all again.
Over time, I realized I'd been approaching problems the same way throughout my entire career. I just hadn't codified it.
As AI matured, I saw an opportunity to do more than organize my work. I could operationalize the way I think, creating a living body of work that compounds with every conversation, every decision, every project, and every new technology.
That's what eventually became TVC-OS.
Sometimes it's an AI tool. Sometimes it's a publishing system. Sometimes it's an excuse to learn a new technology simply because I'm curious where it's headed.
I also host TVC Salons in New Orleans, bringing together founders, operators, marketers, and people who enjoy good conversations about difficult questions.
