I'm Barry, and I'm passionate about helping others navigate work-life transitions and reinventions. To help you better understand my career journeys, I need to start back in high school…

A brush with death from a car accident my senior year of high school left me changed — a TBI, severely broken bones, and a serious challenge. With a very real knowing that anyone can die at any moment, my approach to life essentially became, ‘Go and do and live fully!’’ Two quotes went up on my wall,

“Don't be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better.” 

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

“Up sluggard and waste not life; in the grave will be sleeping enough.”

~ Benjamin Franklin

While I have had the four distinctly different ‘careers’ listed below, there is a common thread — I am a restless, highly creative, original thinker and active innovator. Looking at my true nature and transferable skills, wherever I worked and whatever the situation, I always ended up leading innovation initiatives and teams.


Career #1: Marine Biology & Environmental Education.
In college, I majored in Marine Biology and Environmental Studies. Upon graduation, I worked as a marine biologist for the University of Hawaii’s Humpback Whale Project, where I co-led the underwater work for two seasons. Following this, I started and ran an innovative nonprofit environmental education organization, Mobile Global Learning Labs (MGLL), which led to an appointment by the governor of Alabama to incorporate environmental education into the state science curricula. Another outcome of MGLL was a contract to design environmental exhibits for the McWane Science Center, a new science center at the time, in Birmingham, AL.


Career #2: Entrepreneurship, Business Development, and Consulting for Innovative SMBs.

  • I built my own ‘internet’ startup, Greenthink (back in the day), which was designed to be an 'Amazon' for purchasing the most environmentally sound products.

  • I led strategy and business development for multiple start-ups and boutique consultancies, including an AOL Greenhouse startup, PUSH, a product design firm, and Biomimicry, a sustainable innovation consultancy.


Career #3 Management Consulting (Healthcare & Sustainability)

  • As a management consultant at UAB Medical School, I co-designed and led experiments for an innovative biofeedback lab. This involved coaching over 100 MDs, RNs, and clinic staff in a Heart Rate Variability (HRV) technique called HeartMath for stress and emotional management.

  • I ran my own sustainability-focused management consulting firm for many years, which took me throughout the U.S., Europe, and Australia to work on projects including new product development, ecological and regenerative agriculture, renewable energy (anaerobic digesters), corporate sustainability (I developed Caribou Coffee’s first corporate sustainability plan), and more.


Career #4: Software Product Manager
After starting a family, I wanted to dramatically reduce my travel, so I pivoted into software. Over 10 years I worked for several software companies, including as a Sr. Product Manager in charge of the innovation teams at two of them.


Career #5: Chart Your Own Path + Consulting
Throughout all of the above chapters of my work-life, I always had a strong desire to do more professional motivational speaking and workshop facilitation. I’ve given keynotes for corporations like Johnson & Johnson, opening their World Innovation Summit, to organizations like the American Institute of Architects, and for numerous colleges and universities.

With Chart Your Own Path, I am bringing all of my life and career experiences together, connecting the dots in a way that helps others get unstuck, reinvent themselves, awaken to their true nature, and catalyze new, more fulfilling paths forward.

+Consulting: with the majority of my work in consulting over the past 20+ years, I continue to get a lot of word-of-mouth consulting opportunities and work with select clients on a case-by-case basis.

This quote from Sir Ken Robinson serves as the guiding philosophy for Chart Your Own Path…