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    <title>Northcreek Technology: Field notes</title>
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    <description>Short notes on technology and security risk for owners, CFOs, and operators.</description>
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      <title>Why I started Northcreek Technology</title>
      <link>https://northcreektechnology.com/notes/why-i-started-northcreek/</link>
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      <pubDate>Sun, 07 Sep 2025 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <description>Why I started Northcreek Technology: I've been the IT company, the IT leader, and the security officer, and NWA businesses needed someone who'd been all three.</description>
      <content:encoded><![CDATA[In late 2019, my wife and I decided it was time to settle somewhere new and raise our three daughters there. Then COVID stopped the plan. That delay turned out to be a gift. Friends who were moving back home to Arkansas told us to come look, and we found beautiful country and people who show up for each other. It reminded me of the little dairy town I grew up in, and my wife of the farm towns of eastern Washington. We knew it was home.

Once we were settled, I started meeting people. The need came into focus for me at the NWA Technology Summit in 2023. I spent the day meeting business leaders and technologists from around the region, and I kept hearing some version of the same story. The bill goes up every year. The IT company closes tickets, but nobody is steering. The insurance form asks questions nobody can answer honestly. Owners didn't want more tools. They wanted one person who'd tell them the truth and then help fix it.

I've been on every side of that conversation. I spent about ten years as the CTO and CSO of an IT services firm in the Pacific Northwest, and I set its direction, so I know what the IT company can and can't do, and what it's thinking when the owner calls. I've been the IT leader inside manufacturers, the one working nights and still falling behind. And I've held the security seat three times, the one that has to answer to the owner, the insurer, and the customer. Most people who walk into that conversation have only sat in one of those chairs.

So in 2024 I started Northcreek Technology. The work is simple to describe. Find out what's true. Write it on one page. Fix it, including the IT company or the team when that's the problem, and the conversation with leadership when it's stuck.

Today I run Northcreek alongside a full-time role I care about, so I take on a small number of clients and do the work myself. If your setup is fine, I'll tell you that, and I'll tell your IT company too.

The businesses here are building something good. They deserve straight answers about their technology. If you lead one and something doesn't feel right, send me a note.]]></content:encoded>
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