John's Videos
Why did you choose Atlas MedStaff?
The people, culture, and projects. And it really feels like a great time to join Atlas.
Company culture and an ethical organization, a tight-knit and family focused team, backed by leaders who believe in their core values, treat their people well, and encourage them to grow — these are all things extremely important to me. And these are all things that Atlas offers.
I have seen plenty of organizations give lip service to “company culture” and “customer first”, as if they were using them as keyword stacking terms for SEO rankings, but then fail miserably when the rubber hits the road. I had several offers on the table, but Atlas was the one that aligned the most with what I want and what I believe in.
Combine that with a passionate team that fully embraces modern digital marketing and content marketing practices, reinforced by proven social media inbound methodologies, and the ability to try new things and be empowered to create awesome content, and I’m a happy guy.
I get to combine my long career as a professional writer with my content marketing and communications experience, data-driven nerdery, copywriting and graphic design background, and 12+ years of social media management and strategy (which makes me ancient in the field). I already know several people at Atlas who love it, and it all added up to the right move for me and my family to join this growing team of high performers.
There are a lot of solid marketing jobs out there, but I want to be able to believe in and get excited about what I’m marketing (and have some fun along the way). Working as part of this talented team who support each other, *and* getting to support nurses who do so much to save lives and improve quality of life for their patients, now that’s something I can believe in.
Family
There’s our baby daughter Kara, my wife Stephanie, and me, listed shortest to tallest.
Pets
We have a crafty Boston Terrier named Bazinga. She is small and fast; the baby is small and slow — we fear the dog is training the baby and they are joining forces to plot against us.
Hobbies
I read ... a lot. Novels, fiction, non-fiction, comic books, graphic novels, articles, the occasional random papyrus scroll that is unearthed from a Cryptex found by Nicolas Cage, the usual. I also write a little bit of everything — in short, I’m usually spending my time with words, professionally or for entertainment.
I also enjoy playing videogames and boardgames, watching movies, running, hiking, occasionally collecting old typewriters, sharing memes with my friends, and watching that vine crawl up the side of my house that I should really do something about, but it has now passed the point of “yard work I should get around to doing” and is now firmly in the territory of “it is aesthetically pleasing and looks like we planted it that way on purpose.”
Mostly I love spending time with my girls, enjoy being outnumbered by them, and watching my tiny daughter discover the world. (Pro tip from the baby: yanking on the strings on Daddy’s hoodie is hilarious.)
Any other information you want to share
My wife and I are both voracious readers and actually met in a creative writing class in college. We have tons of books. Movers hate us. Powell’s loves us. We both do some form of marketing, communication, PR, content writing, and social media management for a living — so we talk about all sorts of geeky and cool things around the house that fascinate us but not a lot of other people.
Before taking my skills and experience into marketing and communications, I was an award-winning journalist for many years, so as with any reporter worth their ink, I have a ton of great stories that are unprintable. Like that time [information redacted]. And then there was the moment when [information redacted]. And of course, the time the governor told me [information redacted]. And I can’t forget to tell the story about the time I found [information redacted] and then [information redacted by NASA].
Ink is in my veins. Figuratively and literally. (That’s probably not too healthy.)
Top five things on your bucket list:
· Get bitten by a radioactive spider, find out I’m the last son of a doomed planet, be exposed to cosmic radiation, get struck by lightning in a CSI lab during a particle accelerator explosion — whichever comes first (and cheapest) — and develop superpowers.
· Eat a fantastic cheeseburger in every state of the union. Parlay that accomplishment into a seat on the National Cattleman’s Beef Association and convince them into making Frankie Laine’s theme song from “Rawhide” part of their new ad campaign.
· Visit New Zealand and go on the massive “Lord of the Rings” Tolkien walking and hiking tour. And/or visit the Great Wall of China and do some sleuthing to discover where David Copperfield snuck through. (I have a theory it’s where the Starbucks is now.)
· Become a successful novelist and later high-five every member of the King writing family (whose works I have read) within the same decade: Stephen King, Joe Hill, and Owen King. If the King family is unavailable for high-fives, I’ll settle for just being a successful novelist.
· Solve the Einstein-Rosen bridge field equation to prove the existence of the multi-verse and cross over the dimensional barrier to an alternate reality Earth where “Firefly” was not canceled but instead ran successfully for 10 seasons. Binge-watch all 10 seasons.
Favorite Quote:
“The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter. ‘Tis the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning.” —Mark Twain
“One of the great truths is this: when one is about to be struck by a speeding six-hundred pound Coke machine, one need worry about little else.” —Stephen King
“I’m Batman.” —Batman