In time, I segued into management consulting, where I found my niche. As a consultant, I got paid to explore (vicariously) varieties of careers and organizations, some in the business world, others in government.
My specialty was open-ended: discovering why organizations and the individuals within were under-performing, and crafting methods to help them function better. Which meant that I got paid to do a lot of fun stuff (fun to me, at least). Meeting with people on all rungs across organizational charts, from Top Dog to New Kid (and comparing different perspectives and skills). Riding with the best (and worst) performers and figuring out what made the differences, then developing remedies. Developing and presenting workshops: some for sales managers and reps in organizations including Xerox, Kodak; other workshops for overseas officers for the U.S. State Department's Foreign Service Institute.
From this work has flowed books like HOW TO ASK THE SMART QUESTIONS FOR WINNING THE GAMES OF BUSINESS & LIFE, as well as two others coming out in 2013. I also took what I had learned from my own marketing efforts, as well as from some of the workshops I developed for clients, and produced a series of practical sales-training guides: SELLING 101: Consultative Selling Skills; SALES TRAINING TUTORIALS; and SALES PRESENTATIONS & DEMONSTRATIONS Handbook.
But it was not all management work. Early on, I'd been fascinated by the work of Captain Cousteau (THE SILENT WORLD) and others exploring in the world beneath the ocean surface.
In a way, that early fascination with what's hidden in the depths beneath the ocean surface transformed into a new fascination: to explore the as-yet-unrecognized deeper potentials latent within human beings. Are we just melanges of chemicals and synapses, or are we "transformers" (if you will) of other energies still mostly dormant within us?
My sense is that we are on the verge of breakthrough discoveries in the world of what I term, not "the para-normal," but rather "the dormant-normal". I'm exploring those possibilities in a series of technothrillers: A REMEDY FOR DEATH: Playing God with Body, Soul & Bio-tech; THE GRAIL CONSPIRACIES: A Technothriller Exploring Deeper Human Possibilities; JOINING MIRACLES (not really a thriller, more a parable, though it plays a role in THE GRAIL CONSPIRACIES ); and another in progress.