Credits

We Wish You A Merry Christmas – The Bracket Choir (special guest star Emily Newton, the for-real opera singer)

Little Drummer Boy – Rachel Ferguson

Winter Wonderland – Myself

The moderator for the upcoming Trabian/FORUM Solutions Symposium has asked me how I’d like to be introduced. In true OSCU style, I’m opening it up to our readers. I’ve included two blanks below and the person who provides the most creative answer will get a coveted $5 Starbucks gift card. Special credit goes to anyone who writes one completely from scratch.

Matt Dean is the President and CEO of Trabian. He founded Trabian in 2003 after graduating from Texas A&M with a degree in Computer Engineering. He’s also                       . Ladies and gentlemen,                       !

For example:

Matt Dean is the President and CEO of Trabian. He founded Trabian in 2003 after graduating from Texas A&M with a degree in Computer Engineering. He’s also a level 5 vegan and likes to be introduced as Spanky McDermott. Ladies and gentlemen, Spanky McDermott!

or Charlie’s first take:

Matt Dean is the President and CEO of Trabian. He founded Trabian in 2003 after graduating from Texas A&M with a degree in Computer Engineering. He’s also written many tawdry romance novels under the pen-name Juicy Iverson. Ladies and gentlemen, Juicy Iverson!

This is trey’s bio. It’s short for now.

Nothing is as likely to bring me a case of the writer’s block as trying to write my own bio. Every sentence gets second-guessed and I ask myself repeatedly, “Does anyone care about x?” and “Does y sound too pretentious?”

Writing a bio has been on my project list for months now. In fact, it’s been unfinished business since we launched Open Source CU over six months ago. We’ve all realized a blog done right has to provide adequate info about the people writing it.

So here’s my bio. Brent and Matt will be doing their bios soon. When we make updates to the format of this site over the next few months, these posts are going to turn into bios that we’d always planned to link to from our Team page.

Who am I?

I’m a native of Louisiana and grew up in a town of less than a thousand residents. I went to a liberal arts college that you’ve probably never heard of and studied political science and the art of partying. In 2002 I got married and worked for a while in consumer finance and mortgages.

In January 2004 I went out on a limb and left my job with a very large, ahem, bank to join Matt’s startup, Trabian. This involved leaving Louisiana for Texas, and I still thank my wife regularly for her willingness to uproot. Matt and I had met in the mid-1990s at a Future Business Leaders of America conference. Yes, we were in high school in the mid-90s; yes, we were what you might call “nerds.” He was, by the way, awarded Mr. Future Business Leader of America, a fact that he probably won’t include in his own bio, so I will here.

What did I accomplish in 2005?

1. Read (and retained) David Allen’s Getting Things Done. Then, bought a labelmaker and some boxes of manila folders, and started keeping a physical inbox. I’d advise anyone on this planet to do the same.
2. Spent ten days in Manhattan and worked from wherever I could find wifi.
3. Found a real passion for credit unions and watched our team turn one credit union client into a dozen. Made Open Source CU a priority, and shared Matt’s and Brent’s vision to make this a resource for CUs.
4. Shifted my work start schedule to very early in the day, and switched from cream and sugar to black coffee.
5. Was crowned champion of my fantasy baseball league.

What’s in store for 2006? (Hey, it’s resolution time again)

1. I’ll sharpen my project management skills and continue learning about information architecture – this will help Trabian continue to grow.
2. I’ll keep blogging and will keep doing what I can to help CUs realize the potential blogging holds – this will help Open Source CU continue to grow.
3. I’ll take more Vitamin C and will keep plugging away at The Personal MBA with Matt.