Summary

Degrees, Licenses, and Certificates

• Ph.D., M.S. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Engineering course work in modern control theory, both theses on aircraft navigation and systems.

• PE. Professional Engineer, California, Electrical (lapsed)
• ATP. Airline Transport Pilot, airplane multi-engine land and sea; commercial single engine land and sea, glider
• CFII/ME. Certificated Flight Instructor, airplane single and multi-engine; instrument airplane

Highlight Career Accomplishments

Research

• Changed Boeing corporate policy on two major safety issues by completing IR&D projects
• Generated new model of airliner cockpit alerting philosophy
• Invented a heuristic to identify atypical flights from flight data recordings (US Patent 6,480,770)

Software Development

• Chief engineer / architect on systems to automatically process data from all of an airline's flights, looking for patterns and trends to improve safety and reduce costs. System comprised batch processing back end, decision support database with raw data caching, and object oriented event driven front end;
• Doubled customer productivity by developing a new application to front end existing mainframe application, simulating multiple 3270 connections on a single line;
• Developed an engineering application that was developed in an interpreted language, then ported to Pascal in less than one week;
• Developed an array processor host software environment that was ported to a new mainframe in 2 hours;
• Designed and was lead engineer on a simulation of an Army tactical communications system that ran multiple copies on a mini-computer, while the vendor's simulation required third shift on the mainframe;

Writing & Technical Editing

• Created 25,000 word first draft of airline training manual in only three weeks
• Suggested changes to 40 page checklist in under two hours
• Suggested changes to client web site in under two hours

Community service

• Originated a new safety recognition program for a 170,000 member non-profit following a three year "sales" cycle

Teaching

• In first year of teaching, 100% of class marked "strongly agree" on "Challenged me to think critically & to express myself effectively"
• Taught four safety courses, all either new or with major revisions, three of them on one to four week's notice

Published Papers

• In Search of Collegiate Flight "Education",  Fall, 2005 Journal of Aviation/Aerospace Education and Research
• Why'd they do that? Analyzing Pilot Mindset in Accidents and Incidents (3th International Symposium on Aviation Psychology, Oklahoma City, 2005)
•     Referenced in Crossfeed column in SWAPA Derivative Article, Southwest Airlines Pilots Association
• The Myth of the Unstable Approach, ISASI 2004, Australia
  
  

Accolades

Jeppesen - Sr. Technical Writer

• "You hit that one out of the park." Manager, referring to generating 25,000 word document in three weeks.
• "You were fast, you were cheerful, and you were fun. And you were a good team member." Writing lead, referring to same project.

Eclipse Aviation - Consultant, and author of Safety of Flight Manual

• "There's some good stuff in here." Vice-President
• "I hope they don't change a thing." Manager for whom the Safety of Flight Manual was written.

Boeing Commercial Airplane Group - Research Focal

• "You did everything I hoped you would." Hiring manager.
• "I could have put three people on that project, and they wouldn't have come up with what you did." Hiring manager.
• "You definitely changed our thinking." Manager

Demonstrated Abilities

Community Service and Leadership

Aviation Organizations

• FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) Safety Counselor (volunteer position)
• EAA (Experimental Aircraft Association) Flight Advisor (volunteer position)
• Appointed as charter member of EAA Homebuilder's Council, advising senior management on policy issues, 1998 - 2006. One of five from membership of 170,000
• Originated XP3 safety recognition program for EAA following a three year "sales" cycle
• President, EAA Chapter 62, 1995: we gave 500 free plane rides to kids, two Air Academy scholarships
• Board Member, Coalition for Responsible Airport Management and Policy: wrote position papers, met with politicians
• Legislative Affairs Chairman, 1993-94, Santa Clara County Airman’s Association
• Led coalition of six user groups in initial design of San Jose ARSA (special airspace around the airport); persuaded FAA to redesign airspace around local airline airport
• Airspace design papers circulated nationwide by Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, representing 60% of US pilots
• Proposed City of Sunnyvale airport ballot measure that passed 5:1.
• Awards Vice-Chairman, EAA AirVenture national air show since 1996

Community Organizations

• Three times Dale Carnegie Graduate Assistant
• Twice President of Toastmaster's Club
• Discussion group leader in church; Sunday School teacher; ran sound support for worship with live band
• Support local organizations with photography, press releases, articles, and live sound support
• Numerous positions in community theater from conductor and title role to most all backstage functions

Communications Skills

In print

• Technical Editor, Kitplanes magazine, responsible for technical accuracy of all articles in national glossy
• Six years of monthly column on homebuilt aircraft published to date in national aviation tabloid (InFlight USA)
• 75 pilot reports published nationally, including a half dozen cover stories
• Over a hundred aviation and aviation safety articles and columns published nationally. Published regularly in Inflight USA and frequently in Kitplanes. Also published in Private Pilot, Sport Aviation, Pacific Flyer, and Flight Journal.
• Multiple articles reprinted by government, non-profits, and vendors
• Letters to the editor published in Fortune, Aviation Week (2), and San Jose Mercury News

In photographs

• Published in 1993 Aviation Week photo contest
• Published on calendar cover, and inside another
• Three national glossy magazine covers
• Provide most photos to accompany articles

In person

• Twenty five year public speaking background -- Toastmasters, International, "Able Toastmaster"
• Dale Carnegie graduate, three times graduate assistant
• Adult communications skills instructor or assistant for two other organizations

On the air

• Hosted three episodes of aviation video series for local access, usually on one take without a script
• Appeared on multiple San Francisco bay area news broadcasts and one feature about airports

On the web

• Webmaster for a small airplane company
• Created and maintain greatusermanuals.com from 100% original design and material
  

Recent classes to improve communications skills

• Photoshop, basic and intermediate
• Digital photography
• DreamWeaver (web design)
• Basic journalism

Aviation Background and Other Experience

Aviation Background

• Airline Transport Pilot, airplane multi-engine land and sea
• Commercial privileges, airplane single engine land and sea; glider
• Certificated Flight Instructor, airplane single and multi-engine, instrument
• Ground Instructor, Advanced and Instrument
• About 150 Makes and Models Flown
• Letters to the editor published in Fortune, Aviation Week (2), and San Jose Mercury News
• 2,900 hours total flight time
• 600 hours dual instruction given
• 500 hours tailwheel
• Have towed gliders
• Passed check rides with two non-profit organizations
• Flying students included two computer Ph.D.s, a VP of Engineering, and a 3,000 hour glider pilot

Other Qualifications

• Registered Electrical Engineer, California
• Can read and write German
• Have studied 4 other foreign languages, 2 with non-Roman alphabets
• Licensed by the church to lead public worship
• Currently building a 4 seat, 195 MPH RV-10 airplane
  
  

Non-Employee Engagements:

2006 - Jeppesen, Englewood, CO. Sr. Technical Writer

• Created 25,000 word first draft technical manual in three weeks.
• Reviewed 40 page checklist in two hours

2004 - present Eclipse Aviation, Albuquerque, NM. Consultant

• Writing the safety of flight manual for customer pilots
• Consulted on training stratagems for new jet pilots
• Reviewed training CDs

11/00 - 4/03. Boeing Commercial Aircraft Group. Everett, WA. Contractor

• Instigated change in Boeing philosophy on in-flight alerts and warnings by re-analyzing existing implementations
• Reversed company thinking on relationship between "unstable approaches" and bad landing outcomes by identifying and researching new data sources
• Redirected company thinking by uncovering major factor in runway incursion accidents by analyzing new sources of raw data
• Conceived and prototyped user interface for "electronic flight bag" (EFB), demonstrating techniques for using line select key interface
• Observed major shortcomings in user EFB interface implementations, resulting in major rewrite of specification
• Reviewed the user interfaces and functionalities of three applications for compliance
• One patent awarded (US Patent 6,669,357), ten more disclosed, plus one not pursued
• Received very favorable reviews after 4 months
• Received special recognition award May, 2002

1996  - present, Experimental Aircraft Association, Oshkosh, WI. Volunteer

• Chosen as one of five charter members of Homebuilt Aircraft Council from 170,000 membership to advise staff on policy and events. Served 1998 - 2006.
• Awards Vice-Chairman, AirVenture fly in, responsible for small team photographing all airplanes judged for awards
• Asked to critically review pamphlet describing air traffic procedures for AirVenture fly in
• Occasional contributor to Sport Aviation magazine
• President or officer of three local chapters

1998 - present. Kitplanes Magazine. Contributor and Technical Editor

• Primary writer of flight evaluations of high-performance aircraft, often including photography
• Writer of technical articles

Various churches Volunteer

• Licensed to lead public worship, following class and examination
• Scripture reader
• Sunday School assistant teacher for pre-schoolers
• Ran live sound support for evening worship band
• Assisting with media relations for special events

1990 - 91. Dale Carnegie class. Volunteer teaching assistant

• Graduate assistant 3 times, giving sample presentations, encouraging students

Various aviation organizations Officer and volunteer

• President and other officer positions
• Organized free rides for kids, several with 200 rides per day
• Legislative affairs chairman for Santa Clara Airman's Association

1980 - present. Toastmasters International Club Officer and Volunteer

• Multiple club officer positions, twice president
• Informal mentor to other members

Employment History:

8/07 - 4/08 Principal Systems Engineer. Rockwell Collins, Cedar Rapids, IA

• Proposed electronic map organization according to flight phase and flight conditions. Concept adopted.
• Invited to review aural alerts for taxiing aircraft, recommended which to adapt and why. Recommendations were adopted at first review, ending months of discussion.
• Averaged one innovation disclosure accepted per week.
• Wrote up innovation disclosures for junior coworkers.
• On own time, gave presentation on designing systems based on most common and most time critical cockpit workloads. This led to the forming of a human factors community of practice that meets regularly.
• Started pilots guide, based upon flight deck operational requirements. Was accomplishing work at twice the scheduled rate.
• Generated customer-centric metrics for evaluating user interfaces and functionality

7/05 - 8/07 Self-employed

• Wrote 25,000 word flight operations manual in three weeks for aviation training client.
• Researched runway incursions pro bono, presented paper. Paper is now circulated at regional FAA runway safety symposi.
• Took classes in journalism, digital photography, PhotoShop, and creative writing

5/03 - 7/05 Assistant Research Professor. Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, Prescott, AZ

• Developed and taught graduate seminar on classical airline accidents and how to analyze NTSB reports, on one week's notice. Seminar was upgraded to regular class.
• Taught graduate class on crashworthiness, with revised curriculum, on one month's notice
• Taught graduate class on system safety, with revised curriculum, on one month's notice
• Won NASA grant with proposal due the day before official start dateTaught graduate class on system safety, with revised curriculum, on one month's notice
• Won NASA grant with proposal due the day before official start date
• Conceived of new vehicular guidance technique, supervised Master's thesis on topic, demonstrated in flight test
• Patent issued for that guidance technique (US Patent 7,184,883)
• Chaired faculty search committee
• Revamped analysis taxonomy for Alaska air taxi accidents on FAA contract
• Audited classes on industrial hygiene, epidemiology
• Publications:
  "The Myth of the Unstable Approach," International Society of Air Safety Investigators conference, Queensland, Australia, August 2004
  "The PEEMBO Model for Accident Analysis,"13th International Symposium on Aviation Psychology, April, 2005
  "An Outsider's Look at Collegiate Flight 'Education' ", Journal of Aviation/Aerospace Education and Research, Fall, 2005

11/00 - 4/03. Boeing Commercial Aircraft Group. Everett, WA. Contractor

• Instigated change in Boeing philosophy on in-flight alerts and warnings by re-analyzing existing implementations
  
• Reversed company thinking on relationship between "unstable approaches" and bad landing outcomes by identifying and researching new data sources
  
• Redirected company thinking by uncovering major factor in runway incursion accidents by analyzing new sources of raw data
  
• Conceived and prototyped user interface for "electronic flight bag" (EFB), demonstrating techniques for using line select key interface
  
• Observed major shortcomings in user EFB interface implementations, resulting in major rewrite of specification
  
• Reviewed the user interfaces and functionalities of three applications for compliance
  
• One patent awarded  (US Patent 6,669,357), ten more disclosed, plus one not pursued
  
• Received very favorable reviews after 4 months
  
• Received special recognition award May, 2002

8/98-9/00. Honeywell, formerly AlliedSignal. Redmond, WA.

• Invented a heuristic to identify atypical airline flights from flight data recorder information (US Patent 6,480,770);
  
• Transferred architecture to development team with meetings and white papers;
  
• Suggested upgrades to existing products for better integration with rest of system;
  
• Designed and implemented much of Oracle database;
  
• Gave presentations at conferences and to customers;
  
• Contributed major sections to proposal efforts;
  
• Took classes in OOA/OOD/UML; business simulation; negotiating

2/95-8/98 NASA Aviation Safety and Reporting Office, run by Battelle Memorial Institute. Mountain View, CA.

• Received key contributor award;
• Architected schemes for processing digital flight data from routine airline flights;
• Refocused program from statistically oriented to decision support;
• Led implementation effort, including modifications to vendor software, uncovering bug in vendor software, designing algorithms, and implementing data base and user interface;
• Articulated key concept for both data presentation and data compaction;
• Investigated existing databases for supporting automated safety trend detection.

11/93-2/95 Wireless Access. San Jose, CA.

• Developed user interface for SkyTyper two-way pager, now in production;
• Developed user interface demo in 9 days from date of hire of new product in new industry from minimal specification;
• Analyzed systems engineering implications of two way paging protocol;
• Identified missing features in published API and underlying hardware;
• Established positive relationship with major customer, bringing 5 month project in on time after starting 1 month late, enabling $375K payment;
• Promoted after three months.

11/86-1/93 Apple Computer, Senior Engineer. Cupertino, CA.

• Doubled customer productivity by designing airline maintenance control system in 60 days. Gave 30 demos to customers from engineers to Senior VPs;
• Demonstrated novel tools to reduce cost of cross platform, client/server applications development at least 90%. Demonstrated multi-language prototype.
• Facilitated $200M of OEM business as sole technical point of contact for two operating systems ports;
• Generated 450 desktop system sales opportunity by demonstrating new client / server reservation system concepts, done in 90 days, to international hotel chain;
• Increased sales by 200 systems by designing applications suite for airline flight operations system;
• Closed VAR deal by evangelizing technical feature of OS on no notice;
• Salvaged customer’s project by learning new development environment and using it for a week;
• Won customer converts with briefings at trade shows and in executive briefing center;

6/84-10/86 ESL, Inc, Staff Engineer. Sunnyvale, CA.

• Developed user interface part of networked image processing within two weeks of starting on Sun workstation and C language;
• Implemented user interface features to constantly changing requirements on two projects;
• Earned customer recognition for user interfaces in classified system;
• Trained systems engineers in modern user interface techniques;
• Headed technical discussions with German company on software for project;
• Consulted with peers on software methodologies projects;

4/83-5/84 Androbot, Inc, Software Manager. San Jose, CA.

• Shipped ROM based remote control home robot which had simultaneous hardware/software development);
• Implemented original multiprocessor message passing architecture for home robot;
• Developed reversible, uncompilable, decompilable robot control language for novice, non-programmer robot users;
• Solved hardware/software problem by finding incorrectly specified part;
• Gave demos to national magazines and TV networks.

8/82-4/83 Calma Company, Senior Engineer. Sunnyvale, CA.

• Implemented project in minimal time by doing first version in one language and translating code to final development environment in 7 days;

1/82-6/82 Star Technologies, Senior Programmer/Analyst. Minneapolis, MN.

• Developed array processor host system software environment that was ported from one mainframe environment to another in 2 hours;

3/77-1/82 SRI International, Senior Engineer Menlo Park, CA.

• Increased jet airliner safety by demonstrating value of wind shear recovery technique now taught;
• Implemented on schedule digital communications system simulation as team leader and architect, improving performance at least 10 fold.
• Ported digital signal processing code from one system to another.

10/75-3/77 Systems Control, Engineer. Palo Alto, CA.

• Analyzed airborne navigation systems