David VanEpps, Chief Operating Officer

Dave@exceptionaldifference.com

Impact and amplification. These are the tenets that inspire David VanEpps in his work as Chief Operating Officer at Exceptional Difference. Through his work, he seeks to ignite technical teams to deliver breakthrough results, champion efforts to grow high-performing organizations, and create a culture of empowerment designed to attract and retain top talent. It’s his ambition that the positive impact of the Exceptional Difference programming can be amplified by alumni and ripple through their respective organizations as they take these concepts and put them into practice.

As COO, David employs a motivational approach to leadership, seeking to bring out the best in those around him and enhance their ability to rapidly deliver value. As a proven leader, he strives to simultaneously delight engineers, end users, and other key stakeholders by bridging the business-technology gap to simplify complex concepts into digestible components and actionable requirements. Further, David’s belief in people allows him to develop enterprise technology strategies and roadmaps built around high-performing teams capable of delivering results that align with the scaling requirements of a high growth company.  

In his previous role as Vice President of Engineering and Information Technology at Ursa Space Systems, David was responsible for leading platform building and development of artificial intelligence machine learning capabilities to deliver satellite intelligence as a service. Charged with developing technology strategy, David was able to execute his project portfolio with 95% on-time delivery while reducing production deficits by 73%. His improved engineering processes and change management enabled Ursa Space Systems to scale 3x. 

David holds a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science and a Master of Science in Software Development and Management, both from the Rochester Institute of Technology. An avid runner and cyclist, he has completed 8 Ironman Triathlons, 16 marathons, and a double marathon. He and his wife reside in Harrison Township, Michigan. David is also a published author of three books. 

David encourages you to live a life of impact and make a positive difference in all that you do.