After graduating from Southeast Community College with an associate degree in electro-mechanical technology, Doug had a career as a maintenance man, for 9 years, in the Omaha area. Without warning in 1995 he lost is vision and went from being sighted too fully blind. He did 6-7 months of rehab and then spent 7 years looking for new employment. Three years after losing his vision, he welcomed his twin daughters into his life. With this new addition to his family, he wanted to get back into the workforce. He found Outlook Nebraska in 2002 and started his employment with First Star Fiber, where he ran the case packer. When Outlook Nebraska separated from First Star Fiber in 2008, he became a manual packer, until the wrapper machines were purchased. He took on the challenge of running those machines until 2011.
In 2011, Doug went back to school at Bellevue University and started working as an adaptive technology trainer at Outlook. In May 2012, he earned his BS in Business. Doug continues to help grow the adaptive technology program into what is today.
In 2015, Doug got a new member of his family, when he flew to New York for training and to meet his dog guide Phineas. Because of Phineas, Doug has become very independent and even flies to supervisor training classes on his own.
When asked what the best part of his job is and what advice he would give to someone new to vision loss, he said, “when a client has an aha moment and then gets the technology they are training on. I love to see my clients achieve their goals. Don’t give up, it might seem to you as if you can’t do anything after losing your vision, but the technology is out there to help you do the everyday tasks. You just need to search for the right people to help you. I thought that way until I found Outlook and got to messing around with technology. It is amazing what you can achieve if you just give it the effort.”
We loved having Doug and Phineas as part of the Outlook Enrichment team. Doug touched so many lives during his time at Outlook, and he will be greatly missed.
