I’m the one with glasses.
I’m an entrepreneur and generally curious guy living in the Bay Area with my wife and daughters. I’m bad at sitting still and love to be outdoors biking, hiking or skiing.
My career has been a generalist’s discovery process, ultimately landing on technology development and product management after stints in accounting and marketing.
I was diagnosed with ADHD during college, and my years-long attempt at debugging my brain led to an interest in psychology and self-improvement. My time as an armchair scientist led to a thesis (and you can’t really be a scientist without a thesis) that task-tracking ignores some basic psychological principles. I then created a new type of productivity tool based around questions rather than bullet points. The result, Headway, is an app that facilitates goal achievement through a morning and evening conversation with yourself about your day and performance.
Headway is a self-designed and -funded experiment where I eschewed most of Silicon Valley’s advice in hopes of an asymmetric outcome. Thus far, it’s proven difficult and emotionally volatile, but as an ancient proverb once said, you break down zero percent of the walls you don’t run headlong into. Thus far, I’ve learned a lot about wall materials and construction...
In the meantime, I’ve gotten married, done some investing in public and private equities, bought a house, and had two wonderful kids. I’ve learned how to DIY many household projects, and gotten much better at mountain biking and dancing (according to my eldest daughter).
As of 2022, our increasing burn rate, thanks to said house and wonderful kids, has me back in the job market and excited to once again work with a team. If you’re reading this, and I assume it’s work-related because honestly who else is getting 5 paragraphs into my “about” page, then I hope this answers some of your questions. If not, please reach out to dave [at] davemongan.com.