Plan it to the last cable
Equipment is specced, tested and staged weeks ahead, then shipped on the right flight or barge so it's waiting when I land. Spares go in the box, because a missing four-dollar part can mean another four-figure trip.
Colorado Springs, COAnchorage, AKRural Alaska villages
Jason Kozak
I turn messy business problems into clean tech solutions.
Senior Technology Strategist. IT infrastructure, networks, security and practical AI for small, multi-site businesses, from a corporate office to remote village stores in rural Alaska.
6 sitesmoved to one network in an 18.5-minute planned window
251wiki pages of runbooks and SOPs, built in under four months
11 yrsin information security, including PCI audits at a Fortune 500 insurer
Where the work happens
Rural Alaska is not Anchorage.
Much of my work supports village stores in rural Alaska, communities off the road system that you reach by small plane, boat or snowmachine. It's a different world from Anchorage, Juneau or even Nome. Internet comes by satellite, you'll likely have no cell reception, and you may not have running water. Freight comes in by air or on a barge that runs once or twice a year.
Getting there is a project of its own. Bush flights are expensive, a village usually sees one or two a day in and out, and the planes seat six plus the pilot. Fog grounds them often, so you're at the mercy of the weather and the skill of your pilot.
Once you're in the bush, that's it. There's no running to Best Buy or Costco for something you forgot. If something's missing, you figure out how to make it work with what you have. The next flight out is tomorrow, weather permitting, and the weather may not be in a permitting mood. So every install comes down to meticulous planning, coordination and skill.
Make it work with what's there
On site, the plan meets reality. When something doesn't fit, I solve it with the gear on hand, then document what changed so the next person isn't surprised.
Built to run without me
Satellite links are thin and the nearest technician is a flight away. Systems are built to be managed remotely and simple enough for store staff to run day to day.
Live
Freight in the air over Western Alaska, right now.
Anchorage is one of the busiest air cargo hubs in the world, and the villages I support get much of their freight by plane. This is live public flight data, filtered to cargo carriers and refreshed every minute: a small piece of my God's Eye View project.
Checking the sky…
Gold marks Alaska bush carriers. Range: 250 nautical miles around the middle of Western Alaska. Flight data from adsb.lol (ODbL).
What I do
The technology a growing business runs on, built to run itself.
Infrastructure & networks
Multi-site networks, servers, VPN and failover, including remote sites on satellite. Designed so a new location joins without an outage.
Security & compliance
Microsoft 365 and endpoint security, email authentication, PCI programs and staff security awareness that people actually read.
Practical AI & automation
Company-wide AI adoption with training, safety rules and cost controls, plus automation that removes repeat work instead of adding headcount.
How I work
Steady, deliberate progress beats heroic sprints. If I can make something run itself, I will.
I favor leverage over headcount: systems, documentation and automation that mean nobody has to fix the same thing twice. I'm the person to call when the tech is held together with duct tape, tribal knowledge and optimism.
AI does the legwork; I make the calls. Every agent has a job, rules, and someone checking its work, me included.
And I report what I didn't measure as plainly as what I did. A number without its blind spots is how good people make bad decisions.
Contact
Let's talk.
Open to full-time leadership roles and select consulting work. Remote, hybrid or on-site. On-site includes places you need a bush plane to reach.