Alan grew up in a small town near Chattanooga, Tennessee, the son of a high school physics teacher and a forest conservationist. His childhood was split between books and treehouses — equally drawn to technical puzzles and the natural world. As a teenager, he won regional science fairs and built a drone from scratch with spare parts he salvaged from old appliances.
In college, he led a solar car team and interned at the research division of a National Lab, but ultimately found his calling at the intersection of technology and human behavior. After years climbing the consulting ladder, Alan made a name for himself guiding Fortune 500 companies through digital transformation efforts rooted in behavioral insights and systems thinking.