Years as a Camper: 4 years
Years as a Staff Member/Positions held: 3 years on Sailing Staff
Can you provide a brief overview of your job responsibilities?
I develop Apple stores, guiding a new location along its journey from a conceptual sketch on paper, to opening day when we welcome customers through the doors for the first time. To achieve each of project, I build a team including architects, engineers, consultants, and contractors, and at various stages of the project, coordinate closely with Apple’s internal teams such as Real Estate, Design, Sourcing, Marketing, and the store employees. I’ve been fortunate to travel the world in this role, bringing to life our stores in the US, Canada, Brazil, China, and Italy.
Do you have any career advice for members of our Camp community?
Keep your mind open. People right now are working in careers that you’d never know even existed, and a lot of people are forging their own paths, finding a niche, or creating a career that’s never before existed! Never skip an opportunity to learn from someone who can share their own journey with you. It may just spark something in you that reveals the first step on the path to what will become your life’s work.
What do you believe have been some of your greatest personal and professional accomplishments? Is there a goal toward which you are currently working?
Apple has trusted me to develop some of our most ambitious flagships, and while I take tremendous pride in each of these amazing buildings, I’m most proud of the process it took to deliver them. Nothing can be accomplished without the teamwork, diligence, care, and respect each party in the process has for one another’s unique role. Facilitating that teamwork, often with parties on different sides of the globe from each other, and then coming together to solve the difficult problems inherent in this work is truly the most rewarding part.
How do the values or skills you learned at Camp show up in your everyday work and/or personal life?
On opening day of a new Apple store, before the doors are first opened, I assemble the project team to remind them of something that Captain Lloyd taught me: “Things don’t just happen… you make them happen”. We can stand back and admire the goal we’ve achieved, with the satisfaction in knowing that everything came together only because of the care, hard work, and determination that every member of the team contributed.
And character really does count. It’s so basic, so fundamental, and true. In any part of your life, being fair, respectful, and honest with yourself and with others is key.
Is there a person or a situation that had a huge influence on you while you were at Camp? How and why did they/it impact you?
The friends I met at camp all those years ago, many of which are still a part of my life to this day, had by far the biggest influence on me. It can be a rare thing to come across a group of people that are so positive, so trustworthy and caring, and so darn funny, who set the bar for me to strive to be the same in return. I am nothing but lucky to have met these individuals and call them lifelong friends.
What advice would you give your younger self?
Be open to trying new things, and don’t be scared of failure when you’re beginning. You never know what you may become great at until you give it a try.
Favorite Camp meal: Banana pudding with Nilla wafers for lunch, which not coincidentally, always seemed to follow mornings with leftover bananas from breakfast.
Favorite mess hall entry song: “Desperado”
All-time favorite skit memory: “Celebrity Hot Tub”, which was created in the back of Jimmy Mahan’s big red truck, and would drive right up to the stage in Hut 4. I think even Captain Lloyd may have served as a celebrity guest.
Favorite special event at Camp: Dances at Seafarer. They taught a 13-year old me both bravery, and humility like nothing else. And they further taught me I’ll never be as good of a dancer as Boss Poe.
Do you have a hidden talent? As a counselor, I may have once or twice impressed the campers at the table with my famous spaghetti through the nose trick.