Chris Cone

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Random Thoughts About Myself…​

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• I mostly consider myself an introvert, but the software engineering world probably doesn’t, nor would most people that I have worked with for that matter.

• Most things trigger an immediate thought in my head…most of the time I keep these to myself since they are triggered in the part of my brain that is still and always will be 14 years old.

• I was lucky enough to marry my best friend AND she is likely the main reason I’m not playing video games and drinking beer 20 hours a day (goals).

• I tend to form work friendships easily, as much as I’d like to say it’s all me, I’m pretty sure it is because I’ve worked with some awesome people over the past 10 or so years.

• I’m pretty sure I have some sort of split personality disorder that only seems to get worse the older I get…why?

  • Country music and 90s – 2010 Rap & Hip Hop

  • I live in Buckhead, I drive a truck…I like trucks, parking garages do not

  • I’m a software engineer but I’ve spent some time doing landscaping and construction…oddly, I often miss the physical labor

  • I love being outside, nature is cool…again, I live in the city…in a high-rise

 

Before the college thing…

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Throughout high school I worked at a marina in Savannah, GA, pretty cool gig…I miss the the coast!  I also ran my own landscaping company that started out with a kid stuffing a lawn mower into the back of a Mustang and ended with a hand full of accounts and some real equipment that I miss dearly.  Growing up in a world where if something is broken you fix it, I became fairly handy and had some pretty good teachers along the way…but it wasn’t until I started building houses, no shit, actually building houses, that I learned some skills that I could make money with.  Alas, it’s hot outside and I decided (likely some influence from my wife even if she doesn’t know it) that I should go to college.

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The less personal…

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I graduated from the University of Georgia with a Bachelors degree in MIS and then again from UGA with a Masters in IT.

While at UGA I worked at the Home Depot store in Athens, GA as a Department Supervisor until I moved to a part-time associate to wrap up my final few semesters (should have done that sooner).  The experience I gained during this time is something that I still consider invaluable.

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Once I wrapped up my Bachelors Degree I took a job as Developer at Home Depot’s corporate office…I started writing some Java web services where I was fortunate enough to work with some really awesome developers that taught me how not to suck as an engineer.  Like many developers, as I gained more experience my hands on the keyboard time became less and less a part of my day.  This wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, it allowed me to lead million dollar projects and work across multiple teams, again, super valuable experience that I’m not sure I would have gotten in any other role.

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GM was undergoing (likely still going) an IT Transformation that involved a huge insourcing initiative and hiring effort to fill new roles.  I was part of the first 150 (ish) people hired in an office that would reach ~ 1500 in just couple of years.  I was part of a team where there were only two of us at the beginning and over 60 by the time I moved on. Being part of a transformation at such a large company was pretty cool, and also a huge pain in the ass…but awesome none the less.

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After leaving GM I joined Slalom…the first thing I learned was that it is always good to leave a job on good terms.  Within 2 weeks of starting my career as a consultant I was assigned to a project at Home Depot and would later end up working for the same guy I was working for when I left Home Depot.  Yes, the IT industry can be a small world, relationships are important!  At Slalom, I’ve been able to reconnect with my technical side, which is more important to me than I ever realized and is also part of the reason I’ll be rambling into a blog.

In addition to consulting, I’m starting to explore the startup community and entrepreneurship in general. The Atlanta startup and technology scene is going crazy right now and is a pretty exciting time to get involved.  It is something that has always been in my mind and I’m finally getting around to taking a shot at it with ReferOwl, expect to see some blog post sharing from the ReferOwl blog as I write a bit there (blog.referowl.com).  ReferOwl is my entrance into the community and it is looking like a pretty good one so far, I expect to get involved with more apps, startups and the entrepreneur community as a whole.

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If you are still reading this I’m shocked and hope there was something in there of interest to you. Feel free to shoot me a message, I may answer…depends.