About Author

Hello, my name is David Thompson.

You can email me on the Contact Me page. I would enjoy hearing your thoughts about the posts.

Reluctant Blogger

My appreciation for our storied existence has been growing for several years. It’s full and alive in me and I feel compelled to share it. Though I want to connect with others about our storied lives, I have concerns that I’ll sully my relationship with my subject by opening it to a blog. I also hold hope that sharing it will be enriching to others, and that it will deepen my understanding of our storied nature. With respect to our subject, and to honor participants in this blog, I will be diligent about insisting on civil, concordant, and relevant comments and discussion. See the R.O.E. for intended blog guidance and tone.

I’ll start by describing my recent career path and how it relates to this blog’s subject. If this blog motivates and sustains interest, perhaps through supportive feedback and concordant discussions, I will be sharing more about myself through examples and comments in future blog posts.

My Career and Stories

For about thirteen years I focused on developing computer models, simulations and optimizations across several scientific, operational, and social contexts. I was a staff member at Los Alamos National Laboratory, and a Senior Scientist and Senior Software Architect for Bios Group (a consulting company specializing in Complexity Theory, it was located in Santa Fe and was sold in 2003). Since leaving Bios Group in Jan. 2003, I’ve worked as an independent consultant with National Laboratories, national and international companies, local governments, and nonprofit organizations. I’ve listed selected project subjects in the “Projects” section below to provide a gestalt.

Entering diverse and disparate subjects pushed me to learn how to learn new (to me) complex areas, to effectively accumulate enough understanding to develop useful computer models. Through the familiarity offered by repetition, I began to suspect that the heart of a problem is the problem’s storied context. Though technical tools might contribute toward problem resolution, they are less central to problem resolution than story coherence.

I began to appreciate connections among problems, stories, meaning, purpose, and how we feel. I have come to believe that problems begin with how people feel, that how we feel is stimulated by the stories we are living, and that our feelings are strongly influenced by the relationship we have with the stories we are living.

My consulting work, technical and organizational, has migrated toward more directly attending to the stories behind the problem. I do this by engaging several participants, perhaps 30 or more, in one-on-one discussions. I accumulate, distill, reflect, and update their shared Past and Present stories, in diagrams, narratives and mathematical models until they recognize their experience in the story I’ve collected. I also collect and distill their Shared Future Story, the story participants would prefer to live. I reflect the Shared Future Story back to them, and modify it with their feedback, until it resonates with all participants. (To those familiar with it, I employ Nonviolent Communication in interviews and group processes)

A shared future story creates community. I believe that shared stories are the fabric of community. When members of a community can speak the leitmotif of their shared narrative, their story reaches (what I call) critical awareness. When our future story resonates with us, we are animated to implement it. When a shared story reaches critical awareness, the project community is animated to implement it. Though the details will change, the shared story leitmotif will guide.

I believe that problem resolution is story resolution, that stories are our source of meaning, and that meaning requires coherent stories that resonate with our hearts.

My formal education includes a Ph.D. in Chemistry (with a focus on Chaos Theory), and M.S. and B.S. Degrees in Physics.

Selected Projects

Please excuse the resume like nature of the following selected list of projects. They are included for you to peruse to get an idea of where I have been.

My project path includes Analysis of Complex Systems and Group Problem Resolution. For these first projects, where I only name the subject area, I developed, or co-developed, computer models, simulations and/or optimizations to gain insights, or to guide or improve operations. Here are some of the subjects of my projects:

  • Epileptic seizures
  • Oscillating chemical systems
  • The spread of epidemics
  • United States infrastructure network robustness analysis (graph theory)
  • Optimization of production and delivery of liquid air products (liquid: Nitrogen, Oxygen, etc.) for international company Air Liquide
  • A pilot optimizer for German postal delivery (for Deutsche Post)
  • US critical infrastructure protection models (to help in preparation for potential terrorist attacks and natural disasters)
  • A Hydrogen transportation energy network optimizer (for the National Renewable Energy Laboratory)
  • A model of boat traffic in Grand Canyon to help with access policy
  • I engaged Spokane Citizens, Spokane City Engineers, and Spokane City Officials in a “Concordant Process” to resolve a complex public works project to rebuild a section of Lincoln Street. A similar project on, Bernard Street, completed only a two years earlier, led to volatile and public citizen-city disputes, culminating in citizen law suits against the City of Spokane. The same citizens had similar concerns about the Lincoln Street project. I applied about six weeks of effort in listening, collecting, and distilling, and reflecting shared desires of the citizens, and of city engineers, to form a set of potential resolutions consistent with shared citizen-engineer priorities. After conveying the shared future story in a gathering of the participants, I handed the project to a neighborhood committee  who worked with city officials and engineers in the hard work details and implementation. Two years later, in Aug of 2010, I was asked by Spokane Mayor Verner to cut the ribbon on their implemented, cooperatively developed, and innovative streetscape resolution.
  • In 2009 was contracted by the Spokane Board of County Commissioners to provide an analysis of Spokane County’s legal justice system to identify effectiveness and efficiency opportunities. This involved interviews with 50+ participants including: Judges, Sheriff, Prosecutor, Public Defender, and a wide variety of Spokane County staff, as well as Spokane City Government officials including the Mayor. A large menu of alternative operational processes were identified that, if implemented, could save Spokane County Government several million dollars per year. In the span of the six month contract, several of the low-hanging-fruit ideas were implemented, saving the county more than $700,000 per year.
  • In April 2010, I was contracted by SNAP’s (Spokane Neighborhood Action Partners), Energy Assistance Program (EAP), to find resolutions to stressful operational practices experienced in the EAP project for several years. I approached the project through a series one-on-one discussions with 30+ participants, some of them were interviewed multiple times, to capture and distill the Shared Past, Present, and Future Story of EAP operations. The participants included several organizations including: SNAP, Energy venders (Avista, Inland Power and Light), agencies (including ARC of Spokane, Adult Long Term Care of Eastern Washington), and others. The Energy Assistance Program Shared Future Story was unanimously adopted and supported by SNAP’s board, and the participating agencies coordinated remarkably to implement the Shared Future Story in about 13 weeks. The new program started 10 Sept. 2010.
  • In 2011, Snap (Spokane Neighborhood Action Partners) Intake, Referral, Outcomes and EAP LIHEAP/LIRAP Funding Analysis: Snap was in transition from a decade of fast growth, retirement (and pending retirement) of most key founding Snap figures, and the entry of Julie Honekamp as Snap’s new CEO (as the previous director, Larry Stuckart, was stepping down to complete the Energy Assistance Program transition and to retire).I was hired by Spokane’s Snap, with a grant from Avista, to help them improve their Intake, Referral and Outcomes processes, to provide follow up on changes to the Energy Assistance Program, to provide analysis of the use of LIRAP funds in their interaction with LIHEAP fund in the Energy Assistance Program.This work involved interviewing, and synthesizing information across the range of Snap’s programs to discover the integrating factors among the programs, and to help Snap find what we called their “Shared Story”. The resulting document of collected ideas was wide ranging, detailed, and would require several years to fully implement. At the time of this writing (April 2013) I recently learned that all of the first level suggestions have been fully implemented, and the longer term improvements and integrations have begun.

    This work also involved a mathematical analysis of complicated interactions between LIHEAP (federal) andLIRAP (Avista tariff) funds in the Energy Assistance Program. The analysis resolved long standing confusions resulting in MOU’s (memoranda of agreements) that have eased processes between Snap and Avista.

  • In 2012, Consultant to a Small Scale Metal Currency Exchange: Consulted with local Spokane Jeweler, who is developing a local, small scale, silver  ( and other precious metals) currency business, to analyze economic challenges, business strategies, and risks.
  • In 2013, Executive Consultant, Snap: Consulting with Snap’s first COO to help develop the COO job description, position and authority, and to help develop a plan to implement significant operational  company-wide changes.