André Bearfield
Senior Director of Product
IBM Blue Box
Seattle, WA USA
“I’ve been very successful, and it’s not because I’m special—it’s just because I always focused on what I wanted.”
Videos
By Roadtrip NationAndré Bearfield
Milestones
My road in life has been direct.
He was born and raised in Little Rock, Arkansas; the city had one of the top 10 highest crime rates in America when he was growing up.
Also went to college in Little Rock, where he originally studied biochemistry because he thought he wanted to become a doctor.
By his junior year, he knew he didn’t want to be a doctor, but he also didn’t have the money to change majors and spend more time in school, so he put his head down and pushed to finish.
After school, he realized he didn’t want to keep living in Little Rock, so he researched different cities, searching for a place with a low crime rate and an upward trend in growing technology.
He settled on Seattle, Washington; packed up all of his stuff in his car and drove halfway across the country without any plans for when he got to his destination.
Despite having to figure out where he was going to live and work, he was so excited about the change that he wasn’t worried.
Within a few weeks, he’d found a place to live and the perfect job for someone looking to learn more about technology.
Says that really successful people always take big risks; once he figured this out, he didn’t become a huge risk-taker overnight, but he started building more risk into his decisions.
Keep following my journey
Education
High School
Career
Senior Director of Product
I am the head of product for a cloud technology startup that was recently acquired by IBM.
Career Roadmap
My work combines:
My work combines:
Science
Technology
Problem Solving
Day to Day
I own all product-oriented software development and third-party integrations at Blue Box. The key technologies supporting the Blue Box business are Blue Box Cloud and Box Panel. I design and lead engagement with executives through a plan of record and product roadmap processes. I develop pricing and sales enablement materials, including Salesforce implementation and management.
Advice for Getting Started
Here's the first step for everyone
Understand what it is that you want today. Not in a month or five years, but today. Knowing what you want right now is the thing that should be driving you.
Hurdles
The Noise I Shed
From Myself:
"I have no idea who I am. "
Challenges I Overcame
Gangs / Violence
Financial
Interviewed By
Code Trip
Increasing representation in the world of coding
