If you want my résumé, you can view or download it to the right.
But I'm kind of fond of the narrative approach, too, and you might also want to read the extended edition below.
You can download my résumé if you want the styled PDF.
But I'm kind of fond of the narrative approach, too, and you might also want to read the extended edition below.
Living in the United States gives us many paths to choose from, and figuring out which one to take has been a real challenge for my generation. Whether you want to be a firefighter, doctor, business owner, chef, or something else entirely, you can usually work toward it with enough effort and learning.
Finding work that actually makes you happy means trying different jobs and thinking about what you like and don't like about them. I started out thinking I'd be an author because I loved reading. And since my dad worked with computers, I pushed back against that path and wanted to avoid IT completely.
I went to college and studied Religious Studies and Creative Writing (Poetry) because back in the early 2000s, people thought just having a degree mattered more than what you studied. At the same time, I took a job as a student worker in the university computer labs because, well, learning is great but it doesn't pay the bills.
Even though I was just a minimum wage lab monitor who mainly fixed paper jams and kept an eye on things, I already knew quite a bit about computers when I turned 18. So when the university got hit with a virus that shut down financial services and the bookstore, I somehow ended up leading the cleanup efforts because no one else knew how. When they started setting up wireless internet, I wrote the instructions on how to connect. And when the university changed its name and needed to move 6000+ computers to a new network without bothering users, I figured out how to do it quickly and led the team on the project.
This led to me getting hired full-time at Missouri State, where over the next few years, I ran several big projects, became a manager, and navigated through budget cuts while meeting growing demands. By the time I left, I had secured more funding for my area, and we won the "Best Service on Campus" award multiple years in a row—quite different from the "Helpless Desk" nickname we had when I started.
Despite my original college plans, I discovered I really enjoyed working in IT, especially project management. I started a Master's program in Project Management and found a job at a consulting and software company called Adaptavist. My years working with Atlassian software at the university, plus my other experiences, made me valuable as a consultant and, surprisingly, set me up as one of the world's leading experts on Atlassian.
Over the next few years, I helped many companies' teams work better together. I also helped Atlassian create a certification program by contributing to exam designs, writing questions and answers, developing study materials, and teaching at conferences. When my CEO asked me to take over the training department, I built teams from scratch to develop online learning, write documentation, and create a training plugin for Jira.
While I loved Adaptavist and my team there, I felt my career had hit a ceiling unless I moved to the UK. I started looking for my next challenge and joined Stride to lead a new product they were building.
When I arrived, they had been working for eight months with no real product leadership. There were smart people there, but they were either spread too thin or new to product management. This particular product was complex, and they needed someone with software development knowledge who could guide the product. There was no roadmap, the code had no testing and was buggy, and everyone was stressed and burning out.
During my seven months as Director of Product Management at Stride, I built a 6-month roadmap, figured out how to integrate an acquisition, unblocked hiring, pushed the team to fix 4 months of technical issues while delivering 2 releases and getting 2 more halfway done, and earned my teams' trust.
My last major project at Stride was analyzing a company we bought that had a product similar to the one my team was building. I figured out what to keep from that product and how to integrate it with ours.
After leaving Stride, I decided to start my own company while still looking for a regular job.
Fieldway exists to help people work better together, do the next right thing, and work in the best way. The best work respects both teammates and customers, and delivers the most value to both the business and its customers.
I started my own company after talking with executives, team leads, and employees at dozens of companies who needed help moving forward. With 20 years in IT, I've faced many of the challenges companies and teams deal with today, and I can help solve them.
My goal is to help you improve and move forward without needing me forever. I'll teach your employees the skills they need to make your company better and make your customers happy. I care deeply about your success and your customers' experience, and those will always be my priority.
Learn more at Fieldway.org.
In fall 2022, I interviewed with CoinDesk for a Senior Product Manager role. This person would work between editorial and engineering to manage their content system, Arc XP, and develop features to help journalists, video producers, podcasters, and others who created content at CoinDesk.
The interview team was skeptical at first because I lacked journalism experience, but they quickly saw that I had experience in many different areas. By the end, my future boss shared that what he really needed was a director who could handle everything end-to-end to improve their product and engineering processes, deliver more value, and reduce chaos. He asked if I would do director-level work and get a handle on everything, not just the content system, with the hope of promoting me to a more fitting title in six months.
The truth is I can't work any other way. I observe and think about systems as a whole, so I need to understand how everything works together. I develop deep insights and use that perspective to improve processes and prioritize the right work.
True to his word, 6 months after being hired in December 2022, I was promoted to Director of Product Management, and my boss considered the title backdated to when I started since I was doing the work all along.
These days, I'm directing Product & Engineering for everything we build. I run our team meetings, write all the user stories, prioritize the work, represent our team to leadership, meet with 9 different groups across the company, and help us build in The CoinDesk Way.
Matthew brings energy and enthusiasm into every room. His ability to apply his vast product and project management skills while garnering the support of the development teams that he manages is impressive! I am grateful for his mentorship and his contagious desire to never stop learning and becoming better in all things, professionally and personally.
Jackie Witchko
Product, Program & Operations Leader
Immediately after joining our team, Matthew's experience, knowledge, and value became apparent. He clearly articulated the "why" behind the project to which he was assigned, improved processes, and gained team buy-in.
Matthew is a strong leader, able to mentor and teach, and he has a breadth of experience and understanding across many industries and supporting companies at all stages of their journey.
Jennifer Richardson
Director of Product
Matthew has that rare ability to see both the forest AND the trees. A gifted strategic thinker, an engaged people manager and a creative and innovative solutions architect.
Any organization that is fortunate enough to work with Matthew will be far better off for having done so.
David Fabie
AVP - Global Assignments and Culture
Experience tells the story best. Take a few minutes to explore my portfolio, where you’ll find examples of my work, the impact I've had, and how I define and measure success.
Unleashing CoinDesk's Digital Potential
Revitalizing CoinDesk's Price Pages
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