Jeff Hughes
Principal Consultant I, Desert
I served in the United States Marine Corps and about 3 months before I got out, I met my wonderful wife of 26 years who keeps me in line. We now have two crazy, but great teenagers. I originally wanted to go into Aeronautical Engineering by when I was in college the market was not looking good, so I switched to this thing called computer science. Before I graduated, I had my first job during the dotcom boom. I bounced around and ended up at Apollo Group designing and coding middleware SOA data access layer systems. I ended up leaving and moving on to American Traffic Solutions. I am sure you know who they are, no? You ever get a photo radar ticket? See I knew you knew who they were. I was the principal software engineer for many years and moved over the hardware side designing all types of edge integrated system. Enough about work... I was born in Boston so yeah, I'm a huge Red Sox, Bruins, Celtics and Patriots fan. Things I like to do: Hanging out with my family, mountain bike racing, fishing kayaking, camping, traveling, wood working and brewing beer. Not to brag but engineers make the best beer. I also like to joke a lot. Life is short and we need to do what we love with great people and enjoy every minute.
If you had to describe yourself using four words, it would be…
- Competitive
- Inquisitive
- Questioning
- Trusting
What is your favorite weekend trip?
It's a three-day weekend. You did not stipulate in the question. Stayed in Durango, CO. We took the train up to Silverton, spent some time up there and then went back to Durango. Great trip if you have not done it. We then drove over the Million Dollar highway (it gets the name from the spectacular views) and hopped into the Telluride the next day and did some hiking and hanging out. We then went back towards Durango and stopped and spent the day in Purgatory where the kids were able to do a zipline and sled cars down the slope. Great summertime heat escape.
Sharing our core values is very important to us. What does Passion, Discipline, Innovation, Teaming and Integrity mean to you?
Passion: I love what I do and realized I could get paid to do it. It is finding something you like to do and going all in. I find it interesting when people refer to what they do as work. When you are passionate, it's not work. Discipline: Putting a framework and constraints around what you are passionate about. If you don't, there is a deep rabbit hole with your name on it. Innovation: This word always gets me. We want to call ourselves innovators, but are we really? What is innovation? I see innovation as delivering a life changing product or service. Henry Ford, Charles Babbage, Thomas Savery, George Washington Carver to name just a few, provided life changing inventions that forever changed the course of life. We all want to be innovators, but we may always be innovative failures. This is not a bad place since from our failure's others will eventually succeed. Innovation is not quite utopian since it is achievable, but I believe true innovation is looking into aspects of the world that could be made better, and then engineering that aspect. Teaming: Remember I said I was a Patriots fan? Bill Belichick is the GOAT of great teaming coaches. Watching some of the players that have flourished in this organization and flop when they leave or flopped in another organization and became great under the Belichick regime makes you think why? Belichick will find players that have been discarded but are great at one thing and he exploits that aspect of the player and only uses them in that situation, thus making that player extremely successful. Teaming is getting the right individuals and playing to their strengths, which creates a cohesive team that can trust and leverage each other to be the best and deliver excellence. Integrity: This one is easy. Do what you say you are going to do. Be open. Speak your mind with respect.