It is with mixed feelings that I announce that Mike Woycheck, AlphaLab Program Manager will be leaving Innovation Works in early July. As both his friend and colleague, I say “mixed feelings” because while Mike’s talents will be sorely missed at AlphaLab  I am excited about his opportunity to join Google in a new role in their Shopping operations group.

As many of you know, Mike Woycheck has been a critical founding member of the AlphaLab team since its inception in 2008. His talents and skills across many different areas helped to build the foundation for AlphaLab as it exists today. His technical capabilities, project management skills, social media savvy and interpersonal skills have been needed with the constantly changing nature of running an accelerator. During his five years, Mike has continued to display his talents in all aspects of the AlphaLab operations including helping the companies with their investor pitches, representing AlphaLab to the many grassroot groups in the community, meeting with prospective applicants and efficiently running our operations. His contributions are too numerous to list – suffice to say that he has been a big part of AlphaLab and will be greatly missed.

We are beginning a search for a program manager to take on many of the responsibilities that Mike owned. I will share my thoughts about the position and what we are looking for in a subsequent post.

Please join me in thanking Mike for all of his contributions to AlphaLab and wishing him the best at Google!

Jim