Gary Cooper

Background

About Gary Cooper

I love solving problems. Whether it is repairing a car radio, removing challenges during NPIs, or developing iOS apps. I creatively solve problems with my love for learning, technical knowledge and/or building cross functional teams that bring their own expertise and knowledge. I have two loves, project management and writing iOS applications. Here’s a little history to see how I developed these passions. In high school, I loved writing little programs in Basic. I even taught an adult Intro to Computers class during evening school. Upon graduation, I got my associates in Electrical Engineering Technology and launched my bench technician career where I repaired car radios, postal equipment and ultrasound parts. One of the projects I am most proud of while I was an Ultrasound Bench Technician at GE Healthcare was building the probe testing Global Ultrasound Test Station. I installed all of the hardware, updated the VEE code to remove bugs and added new probes. While I loved the challenge of fixing an ultrasound board or building new test systems, I still wanted to write code. To accomplish this I went back to school and got my BS in Business Information Systems from Indiana Wesleyan University. I also made the transition from bench technician to engineering. I started out as Technical Applications Engineer. I would provide technical support for probe refurbishment. I was also on the process improvement team where we used Six Sigma tools to find where improvements could be made. After three years, I was promoted to Engineering Project Leader which is my current role. I manage refurb and reman used ultrasound introduction projects. As project manager, I work with cross-functional teams to plan and execute projects on schedule. I document the project, maintain the schedule, hold weekly project meeting, milestone reviews and report to stakeholders. I have come to love organizing projects, delivering value and problem solving as a team. Outside of work I enjoy developing applications. When Apple said anyone could write apps I was very intrigued. I went on to learn Objective C and created two games, Lil Fish and Lil Flippy Fish. One day while paying the bills I thought “I need to find an app that will track my everyday spending, on-going bills and tell me when I could be in trouble”. I searched and searched but I couldn’t find an app that fulfilled my needs so, I created one. It’s called Green- Budget Forecasting and I learned Swift, Core Data, Apple’s design principles and more. So, in the end I love project management and writing code.