I got my BA and MBA from Northwestern University in economics in 1981 and 1983 respectively. I lucked out and instead of ending up as a product manager for corn meal, like some of my classmates, I got a job with a small adventure game company, Mayfair Games (I was the lowest paid member of my graduating class, a fact that I am still proud of.)

At Mayfair I got to do my first game design, Dragonrider's of Pern. I eventually became vice-president. In addition to running the internal operations of the company,  I was a game developer for DC Heroes, as well as our board game line and our RPG supplement line known as Role Aids.

 I then went to FASA Corporation and did  games like BattleTech. Renegade Legion, Earthdawn and Shadowrun. Eventually I became president. There I was a series editor for three novel lines, produced CG combat segments for the BattleTech cartoon show, as well as directed a very talented pool of writers, editors, and artists in producing some of the best paper RPGs of the time.

In 1995  I went to Kesmai Corporation and into MMOs. Kesmai is best know for Air Warrior and BattleTech 3025, both online combat sims.  I spent a few years learning the back end of the business where I ran our GameStorm site, handled all of our games on AOL, and got to dabble in some game design.  Eventually I got to produce games for EA.Com, for its brief existence.