The Journey Begins
I have had plenty of jobs and plenty of projects, but I’ve never left on my own terms. The summer internship ended or the ERP project was over and I was waiting for the next to start. I’ve now given my notice to my current company, GP Strategies, which I’ve been with since August 1997. I’m going to try to make a business in doing what I love to do.
During my 16 1/2 years at RWD/GP I’ve been a training developer, tech lead, project manager, training data lead, and change manager. I’ve delved deep into SAP, PeopleSoft, Oracle, and some custom ERPs and I’ve developed over 100 courses, thousands of work instructions, and dozens of eLearning courses. I’ve seen or participated in over 50 ERP Go-Live events at over 30 Fortune 500 clients. Some of these include: The Coca-Cola Company, Delta Airlines, General Electric, Genentech, Johnson and Johnson, IBM, Bristol Myers-Squibb, Burger King, Exxon Mobil, Welch Allyn, Tellabs, Publix, AMP, Halliburton, Sage Software, Polaroid, Merial, Citrix, Adventist Health Systems, REC Silicon, FMC, CVS Caremark, Florida State University, and more. Or by government agencies, passing multiple background checks and working for The Centers of Disease Control and Prevention, Fairfax County Government, Gwinnett County Government.
I was honored by the US Army Medical Materials Agency as an honorary Sergeant and given challenge coins. I was certified as a project manager before a board of RWD leadership and I project managed dozens of projects. I received multiple awards for excellence for my project work and dedication over the years for which I am thankful.
I’ve been able to see the world and I’ve had projects in London, San Francisco, Scotland, Puerto Rico, Atlanta, Princeton, Chicago, Los Angeles, Houston, Skaneateles Falls, Harrisburg, Tallahassee, Miami, Orlando, Lakeland, and more. I’ve seen many different industries and my favorite part was being about to see the plant tours of how things are made.
RWD/GP Strategies has been very good to me and I’ve learned so much during my time there.
But 7 years ago, when [I have had plenty of jobs and plenty of projects, but I’ve never left on my own terms. The summer internship ended or the ERP project was over and I was waiting for the next to start. I’ve now given my notice to my current company, GP Strategies, which I’ve been with since August 1997. I’m going to try to make a business in doing what I love to do.
During my 16 1/2 years at RWD/GP I’ve been a training developer, tech lead, project manager, training data lead, and change manager. I’ve delved deep into SAP, PeopleSoft, Oracle, and some custom ERPs and I’ve developed over 100 courses, thousands of work instructions, and dozens of eLearning courses. I’ve seen or participated in over 50 ERP Go-Live events at over 30 Fortune 500 clients. Some of these include: The Coca-Cola Company, Delta Airlines, General Electric, Genentech, Johnson and Johnson, IBM, Bristol Myers-Squibb, Burger King, Exxon Mobil, Welch Allyn, Tellabs, Publix, AMP, Halliburton, Sage Software, Polaroid, Merial, Citrix, Adventist Health Systems, REC Silicon, FMC, CVS Caremark, Florida State University, and more. Or by government agencies, passing multiple background checks and working for The Centers of Disease Control and Prevention, Fairfax County Government, Gwinnett County Government.
I was honored by the US Army Medical Materials Agency as an honorary Sergeant and given challenge coins. I was certified as a project manager before a board of RWD leadership and I project managed dozens of projects. I received multiple awards for excellence for my project work and dedication over the years for which I am thankful.
I’ve been able to see the world and I’ve had projects in London, San Francisco, Scotland, Puerto Rico, Atlanta, Princeton, Chicago, Los Angeles, Houston, Skaneateles Falls, Harrisburg, Tallahassee, Miami, Orlando, Lakeland, and more. I’ve seen many different industries and my favorite part was being about to see the plant tours of how things are made.
RWD/GP Strategies has been very good to me and I’ve learned so much during my time there.
But 7 years ago, when](http://2014.nasaga.org) (North American Simulations and Games Association – nasaga.org) came to Atlanta in 2007, I saw the flyer and decided to go check it out. My pre-conference session was led by Bernie DeKoven and I was blown away by the conference and what people were using games for learning. I had “found my tribe” and I knew what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wanted to combine my love of board and video games and my desire to train people and combine them into games for learning. While at RWD/GP Strategies I did some pretty neat things in that vein, but it was always me adding to the projects or events with my specialty and not the reason for the project.
So I’m taking the step and leaving the comfort of GP Strategies and try to pursue working from home as a game designer, a consultant for games for learning, a balloon artist/clown, and all the other things that I want to pursue.
One other driver for this change is that my wonderful wife, Rebecca is 16 weeks pregnant with a boy, and I want to establish a business that I can be home with the baby as much as possible (something that is hard with consulting).
So I’m embarking on a journey of a new business and a journey of fatherhood. I have some home projects to accomplish (setting up a home office and a nursery, plus redoing our master bathroom), some challenges to take on (business set-up, health care set-up, etc), and some personal goals to achieve – such as taking on this Game a Week challenge with some other NASAGAn people and reading/note taking from the Game Designer greats out there and the books that I have to sort through.
Thanks for reading and I hope you continue. (If you really care to read my old adventures, I used to blog my adventures at gkoeser.wordpress.com – but I haven’t blogged much at all since getting married and haven’t posted since 2007).