After 10 years of running my own programming company, I have accepted an offer from the National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA) to become their Director of Information Technology. I’m very, very excited about this change and opportunity. The NJCAA is an awesome organization serving junior colleges and athletes across the country. I’ve done website programming and technology support for them the past 10 years, and it is an honor to make the relationship more formal. I’ll now have more time and brain-bandwidth to work on some exciting technology that helps them operate more efficiently and celebrate the local athlete.
Why the change? Besides the obvious that the NJCAA has a tremendous future ahead of it and is an excellent organization to work for, there are a multitude of personal reasons for making this change. Operating a small business is hard and it is even harder on my family: I have a few large customers, but many small ones. Being spread across many customers makes it very difficult for me to “be where I am”.
The first step toward that goal started two years ago when I sold GottaBeMobile.com – a gadget news website that has since skyrocketed in popularity. That was a very good move for our family; however, after much prayer and seeking God’s will, I felt another step was needed.
By narrowing my focus from 25 clients down to my primary employer will bring a lot of stability to a family that desperately needs some. Sure, there are some negatives: bible studies during the day that I’ve had to cancel, less flexibility with my time during the day, along with a few others. However, as I’ve grown over the years, I’ve seen tremendous value in narrowing my focus to what I can do successfully in serving the people God has called me to serve. Of course, there are other reasons that factored into this decision, but that is the primary one.
So, what does this mean for Zoe Technologies? Effective August 1, I will shut down operations for Zoe Technologies. However, I’ll have Friday’s off and will be dedicating that day to doing side-projects for larger customers like GotQuestions.org, AllAboutGod.com, CFACT, and FormConnections. I’m in a transition period right now having to reshuffle my schedule to prepare for August 1. Lot’s of projects to wrap up, work that has to continue and bills to pay, and exciting plans to begin to work on for the NJCAA.
