Alumni Story

It is amazing how much we can grow and change when we stay open, when we are willing to stretch ourselves, and when we place ourselves alongside top talent.”

Football brought Dale to Catawba College. The caring, supportive community he found there helped him transition from high school and a postgraduate year into college life. Looking back, he says that aside from football, much of his focus during those years was on the social scene rather than on academics, where it should have been. That memory stands in sharp contrast to who he is today: a man deeply passionate about education, growth, and purpose.

Having played football almost his entire life, Dale was not sure what came next after graduating from Catawba, where he was a four-year letterman and earned first-team all-conference honors his senior year. For so long, football had been his identity. After college, he worked a variety of jobs while trying to determine his path. One of those jobs was in a restaurant.

“I loved it,” Dale says. “I loved the hard work, the teamwork, and the creativity.”

Food had always been part of his life. He grew up in a family that connected around meals, with a mother who was a wonderful cook and grandparents who farmed and brought fresh fruits and vegetables to the house weekly. Because sports had shaped so much of his life, being part of a team remained deeply important to him. In the kitchen, he found that same teamwork, along with the physical demands and creative element that made the work compelling.

At the time, becoming a chef was not viewed the way it is today. This was pre-Food Network and long before cooking had the cultural visibility it now enjoys. In the United States, being a chef was often seen more as a blue-collar service job than a respected creative profession.

Dale attended L’Académie de Cuisine culinary school, and over the next 10 years, trained in elite kitchens that set the standard for excellence in world-class dining, from restaurants widely recognized as the best in the nation to pioneers of seasonal, farm-to-table cuisine. Motivated by a deep competitive drive, he sought out the highest levels of performance and discipline. “I always wanted to compete and work with the best,” he says. “I’m only going to get better if I go up against people who are better than me.” That pursuit eventually brought him to Napa Valley, where he served as executive chef at the renowned Mustards Grill for four years while also raising his daughter as a single father. On the surface, his culinary career was highly successful, marked by accolades, media attention, and television appearances. Yet beneath that success was a lifestyle filled with self-induced challenges, failures, and disappointments.

“I faced my own challenges for many years,” he says. “They hindered my career and life in numerous ways. By the grace of God, a life-changing transformation began in December 2001.”

Through pain, reflection, and faith, Dale says a new paradigm began to emerge in his life. Old patterns and desires were stripped away, and he began to rebuild from the inside out. “It was as if I was slowly being raised from the dead,” he says. “I was becoming new again.”

That transformation completely changed his outlook and ambitions. Through intentional personal leadership and self-development, he fell in love with learning and later earned his first master’s degree in 2008. Having grown up in sports and then in elite French kitchens, he had experienced environments where leadership often meant criticism, intensity, and being “beat down.”

“Being berated daily was common,” he says with a chuckle. “I was used to harsh critique, and thriving in that environment pushed me to do more.”

Studying leadership and organizational development gave him a new lens for understanding people, growth, and excellence. “It was like all of a sudden being able to see,” Dale says.

He came to believe that while critical reflection and high standards matter, great leadership also requires encouragement, support, and helping people recognize strengths and potential they may not yet see in themselves. That realization became a catalyst in both his life and career.

As his transformation deepened, so did his faith. Dale fell in love with God and felt called toward ministry. He entered seminary to pursue a master’s degree in theology and began working for a nonprofit organization. During that season, he developed a particular heart for people on the margins, including those facing addiction, homelessness, immigration struggles, or life after incarceration, struggles he understood personally.  “Helping others became so important to me because so many people had helped me,” he says.

That season set the stage for another turning point. A recruiter contacted Dale about a role at LinkedIn. He was somewhat familiar with corporate dining and the extensive food programs at major technology companies. He had mixed feelings, but the opportunity made sense. “I thought, if I do this, everything I need is nearby, I can finish my theology degree, and then I can pursue ministry,” he says.

Dale joined LinkedIn in 2013, when the organization was intentionally building its hospitality program as part of its culture and employee connection.

“We started a hospitality program, and it was fantastic,” Dale says. “It was supported by the executive team to build culture and connect employees. LinkedIn was fully committed.”

Food and hospitality quickly became central parts of LinkedIn’s culture, and as the company entered hypergrowth, the program expanded dramatically. From 2013 to 2016, Dale’s team grew by 300 percent. Until 2014, he had never traveled internationally. Then, because of the program’s success, he was asked to help develop hospitality programs globally. Over the next five years, he traveled to more than 25 countries, spending nearly 60 percent of his time abroad.Dale later became LinkedIn’s head of global food, overseeing hospitality across more than 30 countries. At the same time, he continued his theological studies and used his travels to visit churches (both service and historical) around the world.

“Hospitality, food, and religion are foundational in cultures,” he says. “That made travel another life-changing experience for me.”

As he worked globally, he came to believe more deeply that there are common threads across humanity despite cultural differences. “The one I found most prevalent is that everyone wants to be loved,” Dale says.

Leading in a global environment required him to seek understanding, navigate cultural nuance, and collaborate across boundaries. “I love being where people are smart, and where collaboration is essential,” he says. “You do not do anything on your own, especially when you’re trying to operate globally.”

When COVID hit, Dale had been with LinkedIn for seven and a half years. The pandemic caused him to reflect deeply on where he was in life, even though he loved the company. Around that time, a Fortune 500 company based in Massachusetts had been recruiting him for several years. He accepted a role as vice president of transformation. “They had 3,000 convenience stores they wanted to elevate into food destinations,” he says.

Another meaningful part of Dale’s journey is his dream of farming. While living in New England, he purchased 73 acres in Rhode Island to build a farm, taking a significant step toward a vision that brings together many parts of his life. Rooted in early memories of his grandparents’ farm and a lifelong love of food, Dale sees farming as an extension of hospitality: caring for the land, producing something of value, and creating space for connection and community. For him, the farm represents stewardship, renewal, and the opportunity to build a life that integrates leadership, education, service, and a deep respect for where food comes from.

After helping complete that transformation, Dale did two short stints as a senior vice president, first helping stand up a business in Manhattan and later joining ByteDance, TikTok’s parent company, to lead hospitality and food globally during a period of massive expansion. He had worked in China before and was struck by the company’s extraordinary speed and work ethic. “They were working twenty hours a day,” he says. “In Silicon Valley, people work a lot, but this was next level.”

He appreciated the ways of working, but he also knew he was at a different stage of life. Having purchased land for a farm and wanting to pursue a Ph.D., he needed greater consistency and a clearer long-term plan. While working on the West Coast for ByteDance, LinkedIn reached out and asked him to return.

“LinkedIn had matured as a company over time,” Dale says. “I knew it was my next right move.” He returned to LinkedIn nearly two years ago and says the experience has been deeply meaningful.

“LinkedIn changed my life more than anything else in my career, especially because of how much I had to grow with the talent and the global work I was doing,” he says.

Today, Dale serves as Director of Global Hospitality at LinkedIn while also pursuing doctoral studies and building a farm. “It’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but I absolutely love it,” he says.

He believes that every chapter of his life — athletics, elite kitchens, leadership, global travel, hardship, faith, and transformation — has prepared him for the challenges of doctoral work. “Learning has become hugely important in my life,” he says. “It is amazing how much we can grow and change when we stay open, when we are willing to stretch ourselves, and when we place ourselves alongside top talent.”

His doctoral research focuses on leadership and hospitality. By hospitality, Dale does not mean food service or hotels. He is studying the philosophy of hospitality: welcoming the stranger, caring for people, supporting people, and creating the conditions for belonging.

“I’m thinking back to my time at Catawba,” he says, “and that strong sense of community. I’m talking about caring for people, supporting people, welcoming people.”

Dale also openly shares a part of his journey that once disrupted his life: his struggle with alcohol and addiction. He has now been sober for more than twenty years. In 2019, Dave’s Killer Bread, a company known for both high-quality products and its commitment to giving people second chances, invited him to support its Second Chance initiative by appearing in a video, cooking, and sharing his story of recovery and the role hospitality played in his healing.

Dale says he is deeply grateful for the second chances that changed his life. Sharing that part of his story remains difficult, but he believes it matters. “Just because people have had these kinds of problems doesn’t mean they can’t change,” he says. “Challenges can help people grow and change if we allow them to.” He adds, “I don’t allow my past to define me, but I do look at how it transformed me into the person I am today.” Though the vulnerability of sharing that story remains real, Dale believes that if it gives even one person hope and encourages one person not to give up, then it is worth it.

Currently, Dale continues to serve at LinkedIn, pursue his doctorate, and build his farm, dividing his time between Silicon Valley and Rhode Island. Together, these pursuits reflect the integration of leadership, learning, hospitality, and stewardship that now defines this season of his life. It is through combining these ingredients that Dale continues to shape a life that is purposeful, inspiring, and deeply rooted in service to others.