“I may not be the fastest and I may not be the best. But I’m better than anyone who’s faster and faster than anyone who’s better.”–AJ Liebling
My professional road has been a winding one, with many unexpected twists and turns every 4-5 years, but as someone who has made it a career never to repeat myself that suits me just fine. Somehow all of these threads are weaving themselves into something amazing.
Empath & Intutive (ongoing)
Even as a small child, I served as a kind of envoy or liaison between the material and spiritual worlds, the essence and idea, and between meaning and symbol. This balance of left/right brain and masculine feminine awareness is the common thread in all of my professional incarnations and the bedrock from which I create. Initially that took the form of a kind of intuition or body sense, and that ability has stayed with me much of my life. Fortunately the nightmares left but still I sometimes feel abd know more than I would rather.
Writer & Journalist (Men’s Fitness and Other Magazines ) (4 yrs)
Writing was encouraged and nurtured especially by my dad, and I could always count on a good letter or card to clear my head or get me out of the doghouse. I was too chicken to be an English major in college, and thought that Journalism was more practical and hirable, so I took all the creative writing classes I could and ended up with a BA in technical/magazine writing emphasizing nutrition and fitness. I am a curious inquisitive person and a fast learner with a good ability to describe things, so it seemed a good fit, and I did write a product reviews for Mens Fitness and event managed to publish some fiction in a national magazine before the next unlikely twist in the road..into financial services.
Envoy & Liasion (Merrill Lynch) (5 yrs)
After college, I answered a classified ad and got a job at Merrill Lynch, which began a 5 yr stint in Financial Services. I was promoted four times there and in every role I used my translator/liaison skills to communicate and smooth difficult circumstances, including transferring accounts and recruiting brokers from competing brokerage firms, and managing requests from east coast and international branch offices. The experience was a painfully structured one, full of quota but I learned about investment, retirement, and developed great phone skills. It also paid for my Masters Degree from the University of Denver, which began my next professional stage.
Information Architect and Webmaster (IBM/JD Edwards and Aspen Research Group) (5 yrs)
After completing my Masters at the University of Denver, I left Merill Lynch and began a five year stint in software development starting at IBM and JD Edwards. It began a love affair with the clarity, rate of change, and speed of information exchange in IT, and an interest in structured context-sensitive content and information architecture, including online help and websites, and the power of pixels. I used my degree in Marketing and PR and Corporate Communication at JD Edwards, and at a technical analysis software development company called Aspen Research Group, where I served as Documentation Manager and Marketing Director/Webmaster for four years. In this role I translated “geek speak” into the silver-tongued glossy product brochures, manuals, and product posters for commodities and futures traders and analysts.
Director, Nonprofit Marketing and PR (5 and a half yrs)
My orientation is generally toward basic goodness, light and possibility so features and benefits and positive phrases come easily to me. When the dot com bust happened, I transitioned into an opportunity as Marketing Director/Webmaster of a 25,000 student community college (Colorado Mountain College), where I experienced a new vantage point..nonprofits and service, community service and higher education, and I spent four years there recruiting students and helping produce all of the publications, ads, and website content including a new intranet, with a team of three people. Later, I moved into an even more heart-centered and soul-centered role as Marketing Director of Anderson Ranch Arts Center, a prestigious visual arts center where oddly enough I realized for the first time that I was creative and possibly a bt artistic. At Anderson Ranch I had a brief while to explore and experience many types of art and get my first taste of the art community and art world and patrons.
Coach, Photographer, and E-Marketing and Online Reputation Manager (11 years off an on)
The latest vocational evolution is through my own company, Dharma Communications, providing, emarketing and website design and development coaching and consulting, maintenance, optimization, and photography. It has grown into an amazing container for me to share my love of light, words, color, meaning, and symbol, with like-minded conscious coaches, creatives, healers and teachers. It continually expands and evolves in tandem with my capacity to fill It with all my loves and friends and all we have left to do in this world.
Click here to download my one page Doug Ellis 2010 Professional Resume as a PDF file
