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Today's Featured Biography

Lorelie Dobbins Kaid

My name is Lorelie Kaid and though I sign everything with Lorelie, almost everyone calls me "Lori" and I welcome all of you to do the same. I live in Maple Valley, Washington (about 30 miles from Seattle) where my husband is a stay-at-home dad (and a great one at that!). He also umpires baseball and does local volunteer work. Together, we have two sons, ages 15 1/2 and 17 1/2. We also have two guinea pigs (my husband is allergic to Cats and Dogs). They are very spoiled!

Academically, I graduated from the University of Washington with a BA in Political Science and Sociology. Core focus in those disciplines was constitutional law and criminology...I had great dreams of being an FBI agent or a public defender. In my junior year, I came to a couple of realizations. The first was the realization that if I was given a Charles Manson or a Jeffrey Dahmer to defend, I did not believe I could defend them. What I mean is that I DO strongly believe that EVERYONE has the right to a defense and representation. However, my personal values, would definitely impact my ability to defend someone whom I believed 99% guilty prior to the trial. They deserved someone who would defend them, not question them. Knowing that, I ruled out public defender. As for the FBI agent, I still think about that one :-)

When I graduated from the UW, a lot of people asked me the inevitable question..."What are you going to do now?" Quite honestly, I didn't know. What I did know was that I needed to find a job! I was working at a major insurance company at the time, and they posted a fulltime position for a "Systems Programmer Trainee". No computer experience was required but you did have to pass a "test". I found the test right up my alley...very logic oriented type questioning. Passed and was offered the job. I was on my corporate journey and entering a field I knew nothing about!

Spent two years there advancing through the Systems Programmer path...working on mainframes and learning Assembler and Cobol. Later, decided to take another position and moved into consulting, then into the telecommunications industry focusing on product management. At this point, I began to pursue my MBA at City University, focusing on Organizational Leadership. I started my own company in database development around 1995, and we quickly moved into the web development arena. Three years later, me and my two business partners sold the business and I wanted to achieve some sense of "normalcy"...aka "get a real job". Most importantly...I did complete my MBA. I then moved on to Weyerhaeuser where I led their first web development team. I had the opportunity to start a business internal to a larger company and not worry as much about funding :-)

The entrepreneur bug hit me again two years later with a start-up opportunity, no funding. After six months of no paycheck I went to work as the VP of Technology for a web development firm. They became a victim of the "dot-com" economy and I went to work as VP of Consulting Services for a retail software development - AccessVia (www.accessvia.com). Over five years ago, I was recruited out of there and into Executive Consulting for Tatum (www.tatumllc.com). This was a role I loved helping organizations solve their strategic concerns at all levels. I had many opportunities including working with the Government, a major fast food chain and small companies. But, life on the road was wearing on me (I traveled 100%), so I am happy to say that beginning in June of 2012, I started at Washington State Employee Credit Union (www.wsecu.org) as their Vice President of Enterprise Project Management. I am loving my new role, my time with my family and the opportunity for some normalcy.

A long career history, but an incredible learning journey. One which I am still traveling.

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