Wayne Herbert
Personal Information
I'm a 55 year
old Electrical Engineering graduate from
Rice University in
I had anticipated becoming involved in the
electronics industry after graduating but quickly learned that most firms are
seeking much younger people. Those firms interested in hiring me were on
the west coast, an area that was not on my wife's list of places to move.
Thus, after graduating in May of 1997, I took a job with Key Maps, Inc. of
Houston, a privately held regional map publisher. This company provided me with
part time work while I attended school. Key Maps has been publishing the
most widely used book maps in the region since 1958, and has embarked upon a
project to move to electronic publication of their book map products; and to
create GPS accurate GIS files for use in routing, dispatching, demographic
analysis, and more. The work is interesting and allows me to draw upon
past experience, but I may consider something different once I fulfill my
commitments to the company. Update as Of November, 2004: I have moved to
My electrical engineering specialty at Rice
was systems and controls. This is a fairly broad based "specialty",
and includes topics in feedback control, communications theory, and digital
signal processing. Interestingly enough, the methods and disciplines required
in the engineering profession substantially enhanced both my project management
skills and my analytical skills. Any engineering project is a compromise
between cost, safety, "buildability",
lifespan, and numerous other factors, much as what one might find in defining
and executing a technical project; the tradeoffs between scope, cost, schedule,
and quality.
I've also explored courses outside my
specialty, including robot dynamics, machine vision, artificial intelligence
and expert systems, a fascinating course in image processing, economics, and
managerial accounting. Of all the courses I took, robotics and accounting were
the most interesting course; robotics for teaching me that seemingly simple
problems are actually very complex, and managerial accounting for teaching me
how to evaluate investments and cash flows using the time value of money
(another useful skill in project management). I have provided an informal
college transcript for
those of you who might want to know just what I took in the way of college
courses.
Before attending college, I worked in the
computer business in just about every job possible, ranging from data entry
clerk to data processing manager and finally software consultant. I learned early on in my first large scale IT
shop that simply being a good technician is insufficient; one must also know
how to run a project in order to make it happen. I taught myself how to manage systems
implementation, and as a result, I rose very rapidly within the
organization. My technical specialties
are geographic information systems (GIS), particularly as applied to police and
fire dispatch, political redistricting, and demographic analysis; extensive
experience in financial systems and governmental accounting systems; and many
specialty systems. My strong points are project management, business
process analysis, and system design. My resume is available for
your inspection.
I was born in
My hobbies include wood working, tinkering,
taking things apart (and maybe getting them back together), photography, and
reading. I have been politically active in the past, including writing and
lobbying for legislation at the
I have a lovely wife of twenty six years who
graduated cum laude from the
My daughter is a graduate of
Please email
me if you wish more information.
Page Last Modified on August, 2004