You might find Braden munching on Cheez-Its while playing board games or DnD. He’s always sure he’s going to win, though sometimes he’s slowly convinced otherwise.
Braden was born in Marion, Ind., and that’s where he went to school (Indiana Wesleyan University). He later went to high school in Fishers, Ind., and that’s where he’s now working at his first full-time job. Braden is a self-appointed master Googler, who says, “I really believe in diving in the deep end of projects and figuring things out. Sometimes this leads to me being in a bit over my head, but it has made me a very good Googler.” Braden has two brothers, both of whom are teachers and a sister who is still in school. When Braden himself was in high school, he got certified in Microsoft Excel, pleasing his accountant father. His parents live in a house they built in Cicero, where, according to Braden, you can watch the best sunsets.
Jason’s dream world would be filled with interesting people that constantly have new and innovative ideas and want to talk about them. And chocolate. Lots of chocolate.
Several years ago, Jason Beutler was teaching a college computer engineering class when he realized that his students were writing better code than an outsourced team he was supervising at the same time. And that’s how RoboSource was born. With almost 20 years of professional programming experience, you might expect Jason to spend his free time reading fantasy fiction, playing board games, or drinking Mountain Dew. He does. But he also spends a fair amount of time playing competitive sand volleyball and fanning hard-core at Notre Dame football games. His passion for Notre Dame extended to completing his MBA there in 2009. Professionally, Jason is passionate about process improvement and using accountability to grow young developers. He speaks often on this topic, to audiences as diverse as coding conference attendees, classes full of university students, and computer science educators.
Kendra Beutler loves working with young adults. For many years of her career, that involved teaching at local universities. Now she gets to hang out with college students and young adults all the time at RoboSource. Kendra is passionate about stories, and she’s an avid reader of fiction. But she also loves a great in-depth feature story story about pretty much anyone. When Kendra’s not working or carting kids all over, she enjoys making pasta sauce or specialty candies. And Kendra and Jason love to travel with their kids. Any reason is a great reason to throw everyone in the car and hit the road.
Anne’s directive is to “save the world through process automation,” so she has a hero complex. We try to keep the superhero cape off of her, but somehow you can often find her running around the office, cape streaming out behind her.
Hass loves to greet everyone cheerfully in the morning. Often it’s “Top of the morning to ya!” in a bit of an Irish brogue. But last Friday it was “Guten morgen.” We all agreed that it was slightly less peppy than his usual greeting.
John Hasenmyer is the spirit of RoboSource. He just is. He was the very first person founder Jason Beutler hired (even before his wife, Kendra!). But it’s more than that. Hass’ passion for mentoring young programmers comes through big time. O summer, he personally coached all 12 of our student apprentices, meeting with them occasionally to discuss career options and future thinking. And more often than not, you’ll find his chair pulled up to the desk of a less-experienced programmer, chatting about creative ways to solve a problem. Hass once spent six months hiking the entire Appalachian Trail with his wife. But his attempts to lead company backpacking trips have been only moderately successful. Programmers, after all, usually aren’t hired for their hiking ability.
Jerry can sit for hours and hours and plug away at the work you have for him. He’s crazy fast at it. But if he decides to get up, Jerry can be quite clumsy. He loves to be out in nature, and Jerry has a loving robot family.
On John’s 7th day of work, we declared him lead dev on a data project. Luckily, he’s a fan of databases. Wide-eyed, he listened as we gave him all the details about the project and told him to get started. And then he rolled with it, like he does.
John Khol says the only dog he ever liked acted like a cat. And he’s confident that Little Caesar’s pizza can’t be beat (not just for its price…). And he loves to visit museums and press souvenir pennies from the machines. He’s got a collection. John hails from DeWitt, Michigan, and came to Indiana for college at Taylor University. He has an older sister who is in grad school, studying molecular biology. John has a lot of favorites: for example, his favorite movie about bank-robbing surfers is Point Break.
Two parts financial guru, one part parent to adopted teens, one part rock band bass player. Michael is definitely not what you expect when you think of “Director of Finance.”
Michael is a problem solver. He loves nothing more than to be left alone to figure out a solution to a tricky puzzle. Michael simply doesn’t call attention to himself. HIs stress outlet (other than a deep love for music) is rock climbing or hiking or camping. Basically, anything outdoors. He and his wife also have a serious passion for helping teens through the foster system, in which their three adopted children spent most of their lives. But it’s not all older kids around the Neeley household – little Will is always around to keep things interesting!
Even though he graduated as a civil engineer, Zach started coding in high school and continued through college. He has programmed everything from an iOS app for weight lifters to Lego NXT robots to an automated cat feeder. So we think he’s in the right place.
Zach and his wife Molly love to entertain. He even has a signature drink – the Strawberry “Zaiquiri”. Zach can often be found out in his shop, tackling woodworking projects (or more likely, building Purdue cornhole sets for friends). Another love of Zach’s life is cinnamon rolls. He loves the smell so much that he once fell asleep outside of a Cinnabon in the airport, just so he could be first in line the next morning – and he was! On the same trip while hiking Mount Roberts in Juneau, Zach ended up wearing socks on his hands when he forgot gloves.
Purdue University – BS in Civil Engineering (2017) Purdue University – MS in Engineering Management (2018) Eleven Fifty Academy – Software Development (2021)
Stephen loves animals. His dog Luna is treated like a dear child. And he used to have a family of white rats. Occasionally, they would even make an appearance on a Zoom meeting.
Stephen Northam takes our Figure-it-Out Gene Core Value seriously. He is driven to understand why something works the way it works, and he’s dogmatic in not stopping until it makes sense to him. Stephen came into RoboSource in an unusual way – he wasn’t part of an apprentice class, instead starting alone when no other apprentices were on site. When he started, there were no big training days or apprentice vlog. We just threw him in. And Stephen has been excelling ever since. We haven’t yet thrown down a challenge that Stephen won’t tackle fearlessly. And I doubt we ever will.
Justin was an Eagle Scout in high school. For his final project, he built bat boxes on high poles and placed them in local parks. But he’s not sure if any bats ever actually moved in.
Justin Powell is a heads-down, ready-to-work programmer. But we’ve still managed to learn some things about him. Music is vital to Justin’s life. In high school, he was part of a competitive marching band, playing trumpet. Music continued to be important through college. Today, you’ll hear him listening to a variety of genres, but never country or rap. Justin likes to hang out with friends, but he’s also pretty happy having some time to himself.
In the mornings, Brett flits around the office, with a quick comment or question for each person. He doesn’t talk much about himself, though, so unless you asked, you’d never know that his favorite ice cream is Graeter’s Black Cherry Chocolate Chip.
Underneath Brett’s cheerful exterior, you’ll find that life hasn’t been easy the past few years. His wife is a recent cancer survivor and continues to fight to keep the illness at bay. Those struggles combined with his son’s struggles with mental illness have taught Brett to take life one day at a time. But life has a lot of joy too, and Brett says that adopting his two boys has been the most meaningful thing that’s happened in his life, one that happened as a result of a direct call from God. When he isn’t hanging out with the family or building his tech network, Brett is a yard guy. He loves to landscape, watch birds, and relax in nature. He’s considering launching a “Bird Watching Guild” at RoboSource and adding bird feeders outside the office windows. THAT would be a whole new kind of education.
Twen is always positive, and he’s constantly tweaking things to leave them better than he found them. Twen likes to follow orders, and he likes everyone else to follow orders too. He isn’t thrilled when things don’t go according to plan. The plan, you see, is the most important thing to Twn. That’s why you want him running your RPA projects. Nothing will cause Twen a “meltdown” like a plan that isn’t being taken seriously.
It’s a story we’ve heard more than a few times before – Bradley Vaal got interested in programming because he played a lot of video games as a kid. Now he’s finding a deep passion for financial technology. Bradley’s a first-generation college student, and he says that working on real projects has given his education a massive boost. When he’s not studying, Bradley is the captain of the Ball State Ultimate Frisbee team. Athletics aren’t new to him – Bradley was a pole vaulter in high school!
Picture this: it’s karaoke night. There’s a lull in the action, and Aidan haltingly makes his way to the stage. The lights turn on, and it’s go time. But there’s no question what Aidan will sing – it’s Careless Whisper all the way.
Aidan is professionally passionate about mobile app development and AI, but personally? Well, we know that he’s watched all of The Office more than 10 times, so that’s gotta make the list. Aidan also loves to travel and has done so internationally several times, including Africa when he was 12. He has also played piano for almost his entire life and has a deep love for music.
When looking for a new Business Analyst, we advertised it as a “Business Analyst Unicorn,” because we needed someone to do business analyst work PLUS wear several other part-time hats. When Patric came into work the first day? He was wearing a unicorn hat. And that pretty much tells you about Patric’s sense of humor … we’ve been laughing since day 1.
Patric reads 3-4 books each month and listens to podcasts on his commute. He just loves to learn. Of course, one of his greatest educations has been in parenting – he and his wife have two young-adult sons (and a dog). Patric immerses himself in whatever the boys are into, be that marching band, indoor percussion, or soccer. If he doesn’t have events for the kids, he loves to watch horror movies, tinker with technology, binge watch Netflix, or take his wife out for a date. Unless, that is, his beloved Wisconsin Badgers are playing football or basketball – then that obviously takes priority!
